Transcripts For CSPAN3 FEMA Administrator Gaynor Testifies On Coronavirus Response 20240712

Five, four, three, two, one. The committee on Homeland Security will come to order. The committees meeting today received testimony on examining the National Response to the worsening coronavirus pandemic, part two. Without objection, the chair has authorized to declare the committee in recess at any point. To remind members, we are following the tending positions guidance on wearing face coverings at all times, while not under recognition. The chair will only recognize those who are following the guidelines. Today, the committee on Homeland Securitys meeting for part two of our hearing to examine the National Response to the worsening coronavirus pandemic. Two weeks ago, the Committee Heard from state and local officials about how the Trump Administrations failure to respond to the pandemic has harmed their communities and our nation. We invited fema administrator peter gaynor to that hearing, but he declined to attend based on white house guidance prohibiting administration witnesses from appearing before congress remotely. To be clear, that selfimposed guidance is intended to undermine congressional oversight of the administration, but the committee will move forward with its work today. I would note that the Committee Also invited the department of health and Human Services to participate in this hearing. Hhs refused to send a witness even though the committee scheduled this inperson hearing to accommodate the administrations request. That refusal is yet another example of the Trump Administration shirking its responsibility to answer to congress and the American People on its bungled response to covid19. That being said, we are pleased that administrator gaynor is here to respond to members questions about the pandemic, which has now claimed the lives of over 140,000 americans. The number of u. S. Coronavirus cases continues to surge, with 60,000 new cases yesterday. The country recorded more than 1,000 coronavirus deaths in a single day yesterday, for the first time in july. Nations around the world like canada, australia, japan, korea, and many in europe have managed to bring their outbreaks under control through coordinated responses, consistent messaging, and measures such as face coverings, testing, and contact tracing. But here at home, the Trump Administrations response to the coronavirus has been an abject failure, and the American People have suffered the consequences. The president s gross incompetence and incoherent plan to respond to the pandemic has cost lives. South korea reported its first covid19 case the same day as the United States, but we have suffered 470 times the number of deaths they have. Tragically, in many ways we are no more prepared now to address the pandemic today than we were at its outset. We still have a shortage of medical supplies and equipment, like masks, gowns, and gloves. Wait times for covid19 test results are climbing. And most alarmingly, there is an urgent demand for icu beds in states where the virus is spinning out of control. Doctors and nurses in the greatest country on earth should not have to plead for the essentials they need to save lives and protect their own. Just yesterday, months into the pandemic, after repeated calls for face coverings from doctors and scientists in his own administration, the president finally called on americans to wear masks. We are hoping this is an indication President Trump may, at long last, be willing to take the advice of the experts on responding to the pandemic. We need real leadership at the federal level if our country is to overcome the covid19 pandemic and prevent more lives being lost needlessly. Administrator gaynor and his agency have a Herculean Task ahead, in many ways made all the more difficult by the president himself. Today, our hearing is not about blaming china for the Trump Administrations failures to take care of its own people. Frankly, we do not have time for such ridiculous attempts to distract from the crisis at hand. Instead, i hope to hear from administrator gaynor today about where we currently stand and how the administration can improve its response to this Public Health emergency. The American People are counting on us. I think administrator gaynor and my colleagues for participating in this hearing today. The chair now recognizes the Ranking Member of the full committee, from alabama, mr. Rogers for an Opening Statement. Thank you mister chairman. I am glad we are finally meeting in person. Our experiment with virtual hearings did not go all that well it was marred by technical issues that cause prolonged delays on both sides of the aisle. Going forward, i hope we will continue to have these inperson hearings. Doing so improves our productivity and still takes participation by administration witnesses like mr. Gaynor. I understand your frustration with the administrations restrictions on appearing in virtual hearings, thats why i appreciate you working with fema to facilitate the inperson testimony today as i said before, our hearts go out to those who have lost their loved ones to covid19 and those who are currently undergoing treatment. Covid19 is an unprecedented Global Pandemic that requires an unprecedented response. Unfortunately, the administrations response effort was undermined from the start as china hit the disease from the world the Chinese Communist party reported lifesaving medical supplies while they encouraged foreign travel, ceding the virus across the globe. Facing an extraordinary Public Health crisis in chinas deadly coverup, the Trump Administration has responded with a whole new government response. Since march, fema has helped lead the response effort the agency has coordinated the delivery of over 20 billion ppe to him article pass a no, responders and critical workers. It administered 56 major disaster declarations covering every state and territory. And, obligated over 145 billion dollars to support federal, state and local response. While those efforts should be commended, more hard work is ahead. A number of positive cases continue to rise and hospitals in some areas are reaching capacity. Demands for ppe and response funding from fema will continue to grow. I am interested in hearing from the administrator about what our states need to, where the bottlenecks exist in supply chain and whether our domestic manufacturing capacity for ppe and supplies insufficient. As Hurricane Season heats up, i am also interested to hear femas plan to deal with the covid crisis well managing response to Major National disasters. Our country has faced outbreaks of serious disease in the past and in each case, we have marched our collective resources and ingenuity to overcome the crisis. Im confident that will be the case with covid19. Thank you mister chairman, i yield back. Other members of the committee are reminded that on the Committee Rules Opening Statement, it may be submitted for the record. As you know, most of our Committee Room is too small and that is why we are meeting here in our own Services Committee to accommodate the full committee. I thank them for allowing us to use their Committee Room. Members are also reminded that the committee will operate according to the guidelines laid out by myself and the Ranking Member and our july 8th meeting. I welcome our witness. We have with us here today the honorable peter gaynor, fema administrator. Administrative gaynor was confirmed by the senate january 14th, 2020. Prior to this current role, he served as acting administrator for ten months and was previously confirmed to serve as phoenix deputy administrator in october, 2018 administrators danger previously served as the director of rhode island Emergency Management agency. Before his Emergency Management career, administrator gaynor served in the invited states marine corps for 26 years. Without objection, the witnesses full statement will be inserted in the record. I now ask administrative gaynor to summarize his statement for five minutes. Chairman thompson, Ranking Member rodgers and distinguished members of the committee. My name is pete gaynor, and i am the administrator of the federal Emergency Management agency fema . Thank you for the opportunity to discuss femas response and the actions currently underway to protect the American People during the coronavirus covid19 pandemic, as well as the agencys ongoing engagement with the Emergency Management community to enhance Disaster Preparedness within a covid19 environment. One live lost as one life to many in our hearts go out all those that have been affected by the pandemic. This has been a trying time for our country and fema has been working around the clock to help our nation respond to this historic Global Pandemic and other National Disasters. As the fema administrator, it has been my honor to work alongside the dedicated professionals of fema. Today, i want to acknowledge that and our many partners for our commitment to the nation during this response. This response continues to be one that is locally executed, state managed and federally supported. President trump made the unprecedented decision to declare a national, nationwide emergency on march 13th. Since that time, the entire team is worked tirelessly to make a positive impact and many of risk their own health and safety to do so. For the first time in american history, we have a major disaster declaration in every state, territory, in addition to columbia. Today, femas response for 114 active disasters and 97 emergencies. The magnitude of this pandemic is required some reexamining our past practices and to keep up the risk to our staff as low as possible. All the while refusing to fail in meeting our mission. Covid19 has been a Global Crisis with most countries competing for the exact same medical supplies. Every government across the nation has been competing for the same resources, such as personally Protection Equipment, ppe. Most ppe is made in asia, where the violence significantly slowed manufacturing and u. S. Law is limited authorities. Fema typically manages an abundance of resources for disasters that are limited in geographic open impact. In responding to covid19, fema has met more difficult task of managing the lack of critical medical supplies and equipment, rather than managing resources, we are managing shortages. We have worked tirelessly to find medical supplies across the globe and rapidly move them to america. We quickly prioritize resources to ensure that the highest risk of covid19 cases and deaths would not be in danger of running out of supplies and lifesaving equipment. Using the hhs Strategic National stockpile early on, it became clear that the scope and scale this pandemic went far beyond what the stockpile was designed for. It could not be relied upon as the single solution for pandemic supplies in the United States. To address these widespread shortages, the supply chains civilization task force was quickly assembled by fema and its federal parts. In less than ten days, we established the gate bridge to purchase critical supplies, already owned by the largest medical distributors, with the goal of providing temporary relief until the supply chains can be kin to stabilize. Our goal is to supplement. This cut International Shipments from 37 days by sea, to one day by air. On march 29th to july 1st, we have completed over 249 flights, carrying supplies to the American Public. In addition to extraditing supplies to the United States, the federal response has focused on stabilizing lives of americans in many impactful ways. Since march 13th, we provided over 8. 4 billion dollars in obligations to states for covid19 related activities, with the first one billion dollars obligating in just 11 days. Another 1. 7 billion dollars has been allocated in support to our National Guard troops, as well as employment up 5300 medical professionals who have provided critical medical support in most hospitals under stress. To further bolster the medical infrastructure of our country, fema through mission assignments, u. S. Army corps of engineers, constructed care facilities and deployed 41 federal medical stations. As for part of the blueprint, fema has delivered more than 41 million swabs and 32 Million Units of medium. What we continue to respond to covid19, we want to make sure that we are using all our available assets and resources to address these critical shortfalls. To do so, the federal government has utilized the production act to increase the amount of medical equipment manufactured domestically to ensure our nations future preparedness is not overly reliant on foreign producers. This increase in domestic manufacturing will also allow fema to prepare for hurricane preparations and other National Disasters. As part of pivot, fema recently released a Planning Guidance for 2020 Hurricane Season to help local officials best prepare for common disasters in a pandemic. This is scalable, flexible and functions as it all has. Regardless of the challenges, fema will continue to be the bedrock of our nation to remain constant. To protect the American People before, during and after disasters. In the framework by which we accomplished this, it remains unchanged. Responses are most effective when they are locally executed, state managed and federally supported. The nation is counting on us to accomplish our mission and we do so in accordance with our core values of compassion, fairness, integrity and respect. This unprecedented response to covid19 pandemic will continue to require a whole of american effort and fema looks forward to working closely with congress as we Work Together to create better lives for American People. I want to thank the committee for authorizing the resources necessary to meet the historic requirements and for the opportunity to testify today. I look forward to the questions from the committee today. Thank you. I thank the witness for his testimony. I remind each member that he or she will have five minutes to question the witness. I will now recognize myself for questions. Mr. Gaynor, can you talk to us about why a lot of members in congress are still hearing from hospitals that they are short on ppe . Yes, sir. I cannot talk to specific hospitals, but i will talk generally where we are with the pandemic. Just for context, this is a Global Pandemic. I said in my Opening Statement that every country that has covid19 disease in their country to include every governor, mayor, tribal chief in the United States, they are going through the same exact ppe. We do not make it here in the United States. We make very little, virtually no rubber gloves in the u. S. , as an example. We are in competition, still for ppe around the globe. The place we are in today is much better than we were 60 days ago, although we are not going to buy our way out of this with just money. We will have to improve the Industrial Base to make these critical items in the u. S. , so that we are not at the whim of our global competitors. We have talked to every single state director, Emergency Management director in the country and got a feel for what they have in stock in states. Its actually pretty positive. 60, 90, 120 days, states have stockpiles today. Now, they may be shortages, micro shortages across the country based on covid19 cases, increased hospitalizations and those hospitals are those frontline workers that have a shortage and they should work with local Emergency Management directors, local Public Health director and identify those to the state and obviously to us, so we can fulfill those requests. So, your testimony is that all hospital has to do to get the requisite, requirement for ppe is talk to their local emergency manager . Theres many different ways to do it, thats one way. The commercial, medical grade ppe distribution is very healthy today. So if they cannot get it via their normal supply chain, the six big medical Distribution Companies in the country, if they cannot get it there, we can help. We have insights. My point is. To help those hospitals or who else may have a shortage. My point is, its still a problem and, can you provide any written direction to the committee as to how you suggest they can share with their constituents how they can get access to more ppe if required . Yes sir, i want to be clear. We have a ways to go and making sure we have enough ppe. This is not as simple as just throwing in a light switch and we magically make more. We still have many months to go before we start making enough on the u. S. Supply and demand. As cases grow in the sun belt, demand goes up. If there is a hospital or a tribe or a county, city that needs ppe, contact their local emergency manager to go to the state, and obviously to us, so we can fulfill that and address that, by either a federal supply, or commercial supply. Im glad to hear that because it is still part of what most members here in their district. Moving forward, last week our nation topped 75,000 new cases of covid19 in a single day for the first time. We have 4 of the worlds population, about a quarter of all deaths in the world from covid19. Clearly our National Response to the pandemic has been woefully inadequate. When we were, when we held part one of this hearing on july 8th, be governor of illinois, mayor of tupelo by, and the Public Health of texas all said that inconsistent messaging is severely hurting our ability to respond to this crisis. Kansas city help femas response effort when the president says things about the coronavirus that are not accurate, such as he did sunday when he claimed that the coronavirus is going to disappear . My role in the administration is to make sure that i focus on leading federal operational coordination. Making sure that all the things we need to overcome covid19, whether it is rising cases, hospitalizations and needed staff, ppe, pharmaceuticals, beds, my role is to make sure that every requests from every governor, mayor, tribal chief is phil filled to the best of our ability based on what we have. That is my role in fighting covid19. Thank you. But, consistent messaging from all the experts say its important if we are going to get through this and over this. Let me ask you this. Has fema never been directed by anyone at the white house to procure supplies from any source . No, sir. What i want to put on the screen is a contract that, between fema and a contractor that fema provided us upon request. The procurement of and 95 model rp88018. And rp88020 respirators are directed by the white house. You all provided that to us. What i want you to do, if you can explain it now, because part of the conversation we have been hearing is that agents that have been directed to do certain things and use certain contractors. You said i havent i provided you with documents that you provided us. I just want you to go back and check your people to make sure that you are not saying something that is not true from anyones perspective. I am absolutely confident on what i just said about not receiving directions from the white house. It is absolutely, 100 true. That document that we provide it is really an administrative know by one of our contract offices where we got many different pots from where we can find supplies from covid19. I received at the high point, 50 emails a day from people trying to offer me ppe with where we can buy a, all pushed into the system. I received phone calls from mayors, i received phone calls from governors about a local producer that had ppe. I received information from the Vice President and the task force where people would call up hospitals and say i know of a ppe provider and look into this, so that is a reflection of just where we got all sorts of information from everyone. I got calls from senators and congressman saying i have a person that produces ppe. Can you put that into the Contract Exchange . That is a reflection of just that. Thousands and thousands of unsolicited requests from many different people around the country, trying to be very helpful and it comes from all different directions. The gap between somebody offering a supplier, whether its true or whether and the gap between us contracting, and i said it before, is as wide as the grand canyon. I understand, i want you to look at it, that particular information and after you have, get back to us and say, it was exactly what i said. Sir, ive looked at it. Ill tell you right now. Its exactly what i said it is. Thank, you i yield back. Chair recognizes the Ranking Member. Thank, you mister gaynor, for being here. As you know, Hurricane Season began june 1st and the chairman and i represent states around the gulf coast in the Hurricane Season is a big deal for us. If you are capable of maintaining hurricane response and the covid19 response simultaneously . We are, sir and ive stated publicly before i dont think fema has been more ready than we are today. Weve not only dealt with covid19 response, ongoing response we have dealt with flooding in michigan. We have dealt with earthquakes in puerto rico. We dealt with tornadoes. And we are completely ready for the Hurricane Season. Early on, if you are tasked by the president to provide oregon or take over the lead for federal operation coordination, we knew we were going to be in Hurricane Season and so we drafted a plan called up covid19 pandemic operation guidance for the 2020 season. This was done and issued on may 20th. We did this in 21 days. We took on Lessons Learned up to that time about how to integrate a response to covid19 and a Hurricane Season. We could actually use this for any hazard, so whether it is wildfires are, flooding the Lessons Learned in this apply to all hazards across the country. We want to make sure that jurisdictions look at their existing plans about evacuation and sheltering and apply the lessons that youre going to need to apply that we learned in covid19. You will need more time, we will need more space, youre going to need to do more cleaning. All of those things, i was a local emergency manager in a city or a state emergency manager, youre going to go through all those plans, whether it is a hurricane, a tornado or a wildfire, weve provided some Planning Guidance across the nation which that not only the federal governors ready but our partners. It is a team effort. It all has to Work Together and of course we need our citizens to be ready for disasters also so, it is an Olive Community effort. You find those local partners being willing to participate in a cooperatives manner with you . I miss the word, sir. Do you find those local governments are cooperatives partners . Yes, sir. We just came back from a road trip to the gulf coast last week. I spent a specific amount of time in baton rouge, louisiana, new orleans, gulfport, mobile alabama, and check down local and state preparedness for the Hurricane Season and how we are doing on covid19. Many if not all of the managers i spoken to including governors have taken these got into the consideration and are making and have made preparations for Hurricane Season, to make sure that theyre completely ready, not only for a hurricane, but a hurricane on top of covid19. You know, the chair was talking about ppe and some of the shortages that we have experienced. You know, we know that china has been a source, a primary source of production in ppe and i think id like to see our country move away from that in the future but my understanding he response to the chairmans questions is if you feel like we now have found alternative sources that are sufficient for this, this kind of equipment, Going Forward. Is that accurate . We, like i said, before we are in a much better place than we were coming out of march and april. However, we are not out of the woods completely with ppe. Again, the majority of ppe is made offshore. China, all asia, vietnam and so one of our efforts early on with the supply chain control Stabilization Force was to accelerate that ppe to the United States, thick preservation methods or measures to preserve ppe that we had, and to increase industrialization in the United States through use of the ppe. Oh those things happening continue to happen. We are producing and 95 masks in the u. S. You can produce other items, and through our partnership the federal government, d. O. D. , the l. A. , and many other partners, we are working towards that but it is not a light switch, it is more of a real staff and we have some distance to travel. Thank you. I yield back, mister chairman. Hello the chair now recognizes other members from questions they may wish to ask him a wish to ask witnesses. I recognize members in order of seniority alternating between majority and minority. Members joining the hearing via web acts are reminded unmute themselves when recognized for questions and to meet themselves once they have finished speaking and to the extent practical to leave their cameras on so they may be visible to the chair. The chair now recognizes gentlelady from texas, miss jacksonlee, for five minutes. The chairman, i thank you very much for this hearing and i think the Ranking Member for his presence here. We are at such a catastrophic crisis in this nation that however we are able to come together, mister chairman, im appreciative very much. Virtual and or in person. Americans are dying. They are dying, i dont know how many times i need to say this, they are dying. And our hearts are broken, 144, 000, and the number is growing. Administrator, i do want to thank the hardworking fema employees and contractors and others. Thank you for your embedded commitment. You are a man that deals with crisis and that is your work and i think it is your passion. I would appreciate it if you give me yes or no answers because my time is limited. I come from an epicenter and i am dealing with my colleagues across the state. Congressman gonzales has indicated, if you can help them in it all go county and they are short of oxygen, you can contact judge cortez and dr. Blended is. They have no oxygen, people are dying. My colleague, please contact judge for the new, they would like another super testing site, they have no crematoriums, people are dying. Congressman gonzales of the five to 600 people a week are dying. In my own district of Harris County, the numbers now are extreme. People are dying and it is crucial that we know that texas has almost 5000 dead. It has 58,000 cases in Harris County, in houston, theyre 83,000 cases just in the last 24 hours, 784 dead. My question to you is that when the National Declaration was declared of an emergency, did you get handed a Strategic Plan for the nation dealing with testing and dealing with masks . I just mean yes or no, did you get a plan handed to you from the white house . I talking from the very first day . Yes. No, but we had an existing. Mister administrator, let me. I know maam, i dont do respectful but, it deserves more than a yes or no answer. We had a plan was update in 2018 call the pant that plan, the pandemic Crisis Action plan. That plan was updated on march 1st to work into what were seeing with covid. And i thank you very much. So we had a plan, yes maam. You had a plan march 1st. We discovered covid19 on october 2019. I dont want the hold that to you but that was testimony this committee. The plan was written updated in 2018. Thank you. But that plan you did not get when you are handed the responsibility of supervising covid19. Despite concerns from local officials the lack of federal testing support could cause for the spread of the virus in late june, the Trump Administration confirmed it would no longer provide funding for 13 sites including sites in states like texas, which are experiencing rises in confirmed cases. Only two sites in testing have been extended until the end of july. Medical experts say the testing is diagnostic. I would appreciate, into question, why are they cutting sides and in that i am requesting that the National Guard you continued past august 31st or at least until august 31st to continue our testing sites. And then i want to understand, in your plan, did you give states the urgency of the need for stayathome orders . And as you well know, there was a White House Task force report that was hidden and kept from states in terms of members or local authorities, my local mayor did not have. It and in that report, moving out to that reported, indicated that theyre county in Harris County will hotspots in the rewind back on our opening. Did fema get that report . Was there a reason why that report was kept . Should we now be rewinding in these hotspots because of that report . Mr. Administrator. Yes, maam, so let me try to answer what i think all of your questions are, first on the Community Based testing sites. When we first arctic Community Based testing sites, we call them one point no, the first version of that, there are many of those across the country one point oh. Run and funded by the federal government, to really get testing start in the local community and that has morphed into, we are in version three point oh where there are more so than 700 testing sites across the country. Most of those now accessible in places like walmart, walgreens, cbs stores, krogers, where anyone can walk in and get a test. To the original federal testing sites, it was not an issue about stopping funding, it was really about an issue of passing control and running the administration of those testing sites to states. Still running today, i think the last four in your district, i know you and i have had conversations about keeping those running because they are important to your community. We have adapted since the beginning and i think that is why we have been successful. We adapt as we go. I think testing sites, its really a testament to how we adapt to the testing need. On the National Guard, extension, i think we have already had two extensions. The most current extension runs out on august 21st that extension is up for consideration. We spoke about, it i spoke about it with the president , Vice President and Coronavirus Task force not a week that goes by that i do not have a conversation with the governor about extending it. That will be, i believe the administration. We talked about all of that. I think in time, you will learn, we will learn, what the decision is on that. I have confidence that the National Guard continues to provide critical support to governors across the country at the high point, 40,000 guards, men and women across the country provided all sorts of support. You know the kinds of things that they do in your community, those are the kinds of things that we need as we battle covid19. The federal government does not issue orders to governors, states rights. I think what we provided to governors and mayors and tribal chiefs is guidance. I have learned a lot in my role on Coronavirus Task force. Doctor fauci the other day, theres fundamentals that we all have to do. Where in mask. Socially distance, stay away from liars crowds, do not go into bars and good hygiene. If we do those four things, we can continue to crush covid19. Again, we want to make sure that every state is different, every locality is different, locally executed, state managing federally supported. My role is to support those state governors and those elected leaders if they have a resource deficit. The chair recognizes the gentleman from louisiana for five minute when. Mr. Higgins. I thank the chairman for this meeting and the Ranking Member and i thank our witness for joining us today. The supply chain was brought up several times by my colleague. I agree, one thing that is very apparent during this pandemic is that the United States relies on overseas, foreign countries, most notably china where this virus originated, to provide important medical supplies, ppe, etc. I would argue many of it. Its very apparent. As much as been done by the president S Administration to bring manufacturing work back to the United States. I think we need to take a deep look at our supply chains and bring back the capability to produce domestic products of strategic important such as medical supplies or Food Security i would argue we are not just talking about china, we have to consider transit across the pacific. We cannot quickly or efficiently bring supply chains back to the United States without making the determination to do so. We have to have the courage and the will in congress to make those moves and, from the executive branch, we need action as we have seen our President TrumpS Administration to bring manufacturing back to the United States, and our reliance on overseas nations for medical supplies and focusing on sources that exist. Anything that can be produced regionally should be a top priority of congress. Do you agree with the premise of what i just stated regarding shifting to regional supply chains . That would include, not just manufacturing in the United States proper, but using our reliable partners in the western hemisphere, especially mexico and canada. Would you agree with that assessment . Yes, sir. I think just in a more general sense and we have to, this is a National Security issue, ppe. We have seen how critical that is to protecting lives and minimizing suffering. So, we are on a path to increased u. S. Production in the u. S. The recent cares act provided a billion dollars under title three to bring some of these resources back to the u. S. Investments in test kits, reagents n95 and ppe, prioritized pharmaceuticals, vaccine Delivery Systems and supply development are all initiatives that are underway in partnership with d. O. D. Comrades and agencies. Yes sir. Thank you for that therell response. Obviously we are still in the middle of this thing and those strategic steps that we need to be ready for future pandemics, that becomes increasingly clear as we continue the progress through this current challenge. My question now to you is, are agencies right now looking at what regional assets are available in north and south america . Especially again, the u. S. Partners, the supplement will eventually replace our dependence on medical supplies and other strategic products that are currently being produced in china and elsewhere are you identifying strategic, capable locations and facilities with our reliable western hemisphere to replace the threat that we have now. They can just turn the valve off, or we could have some sort of challenge that would restrict us across the pacific. Are you identifying these assets now in the western hemisphere . I cannot speak to any specifics, because its not in my current role and responsibility, but i know generally just because the conversation that is going on, the supply Chain Task Force and other places that we are looking to maximize onshore production of ppe and any other safe and resilient partner we can. Again, i would have to defer to the d. O. D. About how far they have gotten on some of those initiatives. You are part of the administration. They have taken historic actions in response to this pandemic. That means you are in the room. Although this may not be the specific role that you play, according to your job description, do you have a sense from the executive that we are looking beyond the scope that we have been restricted to by previouS Administrations . Let us not focus on the Obama Administration or the bush administration. This reliance on foreign production of important and strategic products has now been over the course of decades. President trump inherited that. It has been changed greatly now in response to this current threat. Would you generally agree with that . Answer that question, i yield mister chairman. Yes sir. I think generally we are looking under every rock, turning over every way we can bring more production to the u. S. , have better partners with more reliant streams of ppe or other medical supplies, critical to the health and safety of the United States. Gentlemen. Thank you sir. Mister chairman, i yield, thank you good sir. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentleman from louisiana for five minutes. Mr. Richmond. Thank you mister chairman. Mr. Gaynor, let me ask, do you, or fema have any role in picturing testing . Yes sir. The fema role has been to provide. So just to step back, the administrator provided a testing blueprint to governors so they can build a Testing Initiative project regime based on the needs of the unique states. Our role has been to supply the materials, so they can conduct their tests. The two things that we have been doing since may is providing swabs and transport media to states. In my Opening Statement, we have shipped 42 million swabs and about 32 million. But are you shipping test kits . No. Fema is not shipping test kits. The majority of test kits either come from the commercial sector, you can get them via the normal let me just cut to the chase. In restrooms aspect, would it have been a wise decision to take the text from the World Health Organization when this pandemic to started . I will defer. I have many great partners. The short answer is we could use more tests right now . We have done 50 million tests. Thats not my question. Can we use more tests right now . I think we have enough testing platforms in the u. S. I think we have to maximize those testing platforms. Lets start over. You are seeing right now as the Fema Administration or the u. S. Has enough tests . Testing capacity is really the challenge of maximizing that capacity. Let me go to another subject. We want students back in school, correct . Yes sir. The president has declared a disaster. Through public assistance, which is right about fema, are you all going to include reimbursement for protective measures for School Districts . Such as masks for children. Yes or. We have been looking at our authorities under the stafford act, what we can buy under the emergency protective measures. I think one of the things that the administration wants to be thoughtful about is, through many supplementals, like the cares act, through the stafford act, how can you best maximize those Funding Resources . I think when you look at the funding that has been provided by congress to schools, its pretty significant. I think there is enough money out there that governments and mayors can use that money to do those things that you talked about before they come to fema. It does not have to fit into our authority. Thats not true. I mean, i am from new orleans, i am familiar with project worksheets, im familiar with public assistance, im familiar with all of those things. Protective measures always fall within the stafford act and fema, when you are talking about public assistance. Its fine to say, well we think they have money in other places, but normally, protective measures such as thermometers, shields and all of those things would and should be. We have the administration saying go back to school, but we are not providing the School Districts or others with the funding. Now the heroes act that provides much funding for Public Schools is wasting away in the senate. Now, we are not going to approve public assistance eligibility for masks. Is that what im hearing . What im saying is that there are 17 different funding streams in supplementals that are specifically aimed at schools and public education. Im not talking about 17, im talking about you, im talking about fema and very specifically public assistance eligibility. Again, i will go back. What is most effective, how can you maximize . Im just asking if you made a decision. There are other alternatives that are much better than staff backed funded. So fema will not provide eligibility for masks . Thats what im hearing. If thats the case, just say no and we can move on. Unlearning this business never say never. We have examined our authorities. We are looking at other authorities that have other money put to this. Lets move on to one last thing. What about cities ability to pay half of things . I have a letter from a Sanitation Company whose guys are on the back of the trucks, increased costs for the cities and dumping. With cities be able to apply for eligibility under public assistance to pay increased costs for dumping and sanitation and hazard pay for sanitation workers . I would have to go back to the rules on that. I could not tell you whether it is eligible or ineligible. Thank you. I will follow up with staff on that specific question. Thank you and i yield back. The chair recognizes the general lady from arizona for five minutes. Thank you mister chair. First, i want to say i think it is mildly im using that after you in your Opening Statement bashed the president and then at the end of the statement, you said this is not about bashing the administration or trump. I do not think any of us really believe that. But, in any case, the next thing i want to say is that in my district, my staff checks on a weekly basis with all of our hospitals and Congressional District data in arizona and they all told me they have enough ppe. Also, i want to address the things about the schools. We voted for relief for the schools. We gave billions of dollars to the schools to deal with coronavirus. In fact, 850 million went to arizona alone and that was to buy ppe, masked, a blitz, whatever they needed for coronavirus. Next, i want to thank you, mister administrator for having a regional people get on fema Conference Calls with me because early on in arizona you know, everyone was worried about having enough masks, enough ventilators, everything, and your regional people would get on Conference Calls with me, the hospitals in my district, the Arizona Department of Emergency Management and the Arizona Department of Health Services and they would directly answer questions to the hospitals and so i thought it was very helpful and please pass on to them that i think they did a good job. Also, i want to address about giving money to states and cities for this. Youve been given billions of dollars to states and cities to deal with coronavirus, certainly what was mentioned by mr. Richmond could be used for that. My next question, mr. Gaynor, is about Nursing Homes. I have read that, im going to read it, the emma has shipped 28,562 deliveries of medical supplies to Nursing Homes, 53 states and territories, fema coordinated to shipments totaling a 14day supply of personal protective equipment to all 15,400 medicaid and medicare certified Nursing Homes and i also want to say that i join dr. Ben carson who personally came to arizona to one of the nursing home facilities in my district so i appreciate that the administration did that. But can you tell, me mr. Gain, or Nursing Homes, usually that term is not used in the industry. Does that mean skilled Nursing Homes or does that include assisted living homes, or what does that include . The 15,400 are the 15,400 registered nursing home with cms, medicare, medicaid. So im not sure, there may be different categories in that and i would defer to an administrator to get the details on that. Thank you. And mister administrator, the last one, as i know youve done a lot of work, fema has, with the Navajo Nation in arizona and in other states. Can you explain and on what fema has done or is doing with the Navajo Nation in arizona . Yes, maam, and thank you for recognizing my region, we have one of the finest regional administrators assigned to you out there, bob, bendability commissioned out. Weve been working that only from beginning, we continue to be out there, i think we have about 25 people in the ground for fema to include many other partners, cdc aspirant, we have provided almost 85 Million Dollars in funding together, about 5 million for fema and about 80 million from other sources. I provided ventilators, we provided search capacity, we provided medical staff, both d. O. D. And hhs, and Logistics Support to make sure that that community could respond to covid19. We continue to be out, there we will stand strong with them until we put covid19 in the rearview mirror. I want to say thank you to you and your staff and i yield back. The chair recognizes the gentleman from new jersey for five minutes. Thank, you mister chairman, and Ranking Member, it is not our privilege to be here this afternoon, this morning, actually. I would just like to start out with responding to the general lit gentlelady from arizonas comments. It is no ones pleasure to have to bash the administration but i see that that is not necessarily in arizona, we have to be mindful that we are here as oversight obligation and is part of our duties and you know, just like in the Obama Administration, if there was need for criticism, we get it, and i dont think any administration should be above it. We are just glad to hear that there are states that are getting support, great support from thiS Administration, new jersey and based on the comments from the gentlelady from texas and the gentleman from louisiana, our states have been lacking so i guess we are not in favor with the administration and so yes, it is who your friends, ours how this is going to work during this pandemic. Mister administrator, with reference to going back to school, do you feel that we have the capacity right now to keep students, teachers, bus drivers, administrators, anyone involved in the school day, safe at this point . Yes, sir. Again, no two states are equal. No two cities are equal, nor counties nor tribes and so theres lots of guns out there thats been provided by cdc and others about what is a safe environment look like. I think governors have to assess their risk about going back to school. Some states, in new england, for example, are a pretty good shape. Other states in the sun belt see a rise in coronavirus cases and hospitalizations and will have to make the best decision for the constituents and so i think what the administration has done is provide guidelines, so we enable and empower governors and mayors to make really good decisions for their constituents. And do you think, you know, i hear the message you are sending out but it is not necessarily the same message that comes out of the white house. What can we do to coordinate the message so that people across the nation could be getting the same message, and the same guidelines. You say one thing and then the white house comes out with totally the opposite. I mean, i know you dont have very much control of that, but dont you think if there was a coherent, solid message, from everyone across the board, that we would be in a better position . Yes, sir, i think from my position on the white house Coronavirus Task force, i meet most every day with the Task Force Members include the Vice President about a number of Different Things, including messaging, pasadena schools, and on ppe, what are the facts and what is the narrative and so, i think we are very thoughtful about not Just Creative a narrative and then finding the facts, we are trying to find the facts and create a narrative based on those facts, and what i just stated about going back to school is what i assumed from being in the presence of the task force so whether it is doctor fauci or dr. Brooks or others, i think the message we are all standing is the same. And one last question. With the rise in cases in texas and other states, why would fema be closing testing sites, as you see an increase in the need for those sites . It does not make sense to me that as a state is escalating, you are pulling out. You didnt in new jersey, at or nearing a levelling off time but we were still having an issue when you left new jersey and you know, to see texas, and what they are going through in houston and in other communities, how do you justify closing sites for . Yes, sir, and so again, facts and narrative. Again, the facts are when we first started testing United States back in march, we had 41 sites, 41 federally run sites. In some cases, we closed sites because they were not needed anymore. In some cases we moved sites because we were testing was not the place to be testing out so we moved them and in most cases we transferred responsibility of testing sites from the federal government to the state so they could run their own Testing Programs. Again, locally executed, state managed, federally supported. Today, we have 750, more than 750 tests across the country so, it is not a single point in time. Weve been flexible and adaptable innovative as we move along. Testing will probably change over the next weeks and months, something, different something more appropriate, based on what we are seeing with cases and hospitalizations. This is not a static problem, this is a dynamic problem and i think testing is reflective of that. Okay, well, thank you. Thank you very much. I yield. Back the chair recognizes the gentleman from pennsylvania, mr. Joyce, for five minutes. Thank, you chairman thompson and Ranking Member rodgers. Thank you for being here today and for sharing your insight on Emergency Response to covid19. Truly a Novel Coronavirus introduced from china to the world and here than in america. This virus has challenged us on many different levels. Thank you and your team for ramping up what has been an incredible response. In face of the ongoing needs of personal protective equipment, what you outline for us, such as masks, gowns, gloves, do you agree that bringing protection home to america and by that, i mean bringing the production of the masks, the gowns, and the gloves home will allow us to better respond and replenish supplies. I said it before, it is a National Security issue. Is my own view, that ppe, licensing equipment is just as important building an aircraft carrier. We need to have that capacity here in the United States. We cannot rely on peer competitors to manage our destiny. We need to take hold of it and we need to bring it back to america bill those things that are important to the nation. Administrator gaynor, and face of so many of these ppe supplies coming from china, would you again agree that bringing these production lines onshore to america would allow us not to be beholden to the Chinese Communist party . Yes, sir, i think our previous statement stands. It is in our best interest buns. Do you feel that the potential production act has allowed fema to better perform your duties . When youre a, yes, sir. We used the gpa 14 times. We continue to use it for a variety of challenges that we see. Again, it is not as easy as flipping the switch and moving from making toasters one day to making events the next day. There is thoughtful consideration about using gpa. One of our initial beliefs was we wanted to do no harm to the system, nick sure we understood if we did, this whats going to be the result of that unforeseen consequences. So, we used deliberately, we are precisely, make sure that we go we needed at the right amount of time. I think the production of ventilators is an excellent example of how the administration used epa to save lives him minimize suffering. You addressed National Security and safety. Do you feel that bringing safely home the production of medicines, both prescription and over the counter medicines, vaccine production, and therapeutics, personal Protection Equipment that we have discussed, are all necessary components for an effective National Security and safety of all of our citizens . Yes, sir. And i want to thank congress for providing a billion dollars to the department of defense, to do all those things. How to become more resilient by bringing some of those things back home. Thank, you administrator gaynor, for being here today, to addressing our questions and for working hard as we fight this Novel Coronavirus. Again, thank, you and i yield the remainder of my time. Thank you. The chair recognizes the gentlelady from new york for five minutes, this rice. Then , you mister chairman. Mr. Gates, when we held part one of this hearing a few weeks ago, governor potsticker of illinois noted that project average was, and i am quoting him, and utter and complete failure in his state of illinois but i think this was in part. Because project air bridge and the medical supply company, that you, fema, have company have partnered with this project, i will be supplies from overseas to existing customers incentive disturbing those supplies by need. It is my understanding that project airbridge has operated 49 flight. What percentage of the National Need for ppe was surprised by the airbridge project . Yes, maam, and thank you for giving the opportunity to once again clarify. I think the governor of illinois is misinformed about the purpose of airbridge, and if hes calling it a failure, i will just say that we ship to his state of illinois 100, or 1 million face shields, and 841 million gloves, 60 million gowns, nearly 12 million a 95 masks and nearly 45 million masks. So if it was a failure, then i guess thats a failure. The purpose of air bridge. Mr. Gaynor, if i can interrupt you there for a second. Im asking specifically about air bridge. I do not know if you saw there was a recent report back in may from the Washington Post that reported overall that project air bridge flights had distributed 760,000 n95 masks, which is far fewer than 85 million and 95 max produced through the federal relief effort. The numbers that you use, specifically to the average project, not other conventional federal relief efforts. Again, you brought up the governor, so want to make sure whats clear with fact and what is an informed narrative. Airbridge, again, i said in my Opening Statement was our effort to accelerate ppe from around the globe to the u. S. To prevent suffering and to save lives. Very simple. We have partnered with the six biggest commercial medical grade distributors in the country. Companies like mckesson, cardinal and others to partner with them to bring this ppe to the United States. Again, typically it takes 37 days to put ppe on a container ship and get from shanghai to l. A. We did this in one day with an the airbridge flight. Mr. Gaynor, let me stop you there because i are very limited time. I understand that it sped of the time that it took to get here. If its not going where it needs to go, for instance, Nursing Homes do not have previous relationships, necessarily with medical supply companies and, its my understanding that once the ppe got here, it was basically left up to the medical distributors to decide where it was going to go. There was a requirement that it go in order to justify the subsidized what cost of the flight, that it had to go to states with the most need, but thats not how it happened because they prioritized people with whom they had prior relationships. Yes maam. Again, if its not going where needed to go we know that it didnt, thats not right. Its not. I want to be respectful, thats not how it worked. Our agreement, our written legal agreement with the big six manufacturers and distributors was 50 of all the ppe that we moved via airbridge, to include what commercial distributors brought in on their own, 50 of all of that was directed to hotspots. Those hotspots were prioritized by us. Fema, hhs, doctor birx with her daily data to make sure that we are aiming lifesaving ppe to the places that need it the most. Commercial companies did not pick and choose where they sent it. A certain percentage, yes, they can use a certain percentage to service their customers, but for the majority of that ppe, they directed it because we prioritized it to where it was needed the most. We did that every 96 hours to make sure that we understood where those places that need it the most and directed those distributors to do it. One of the great things about airbridge an hour supply train control tower, we can see down to exactly into all the six commercial distributors what is on the shelf, what was ordered, would zip code it went to and what hospital it went to. We supplied all of that data, every week, we still do it every week to governors to show here is all the ppe, whether it is donated, whether it is air bridge or whether it is government, it all goes to these exact places. The governors have complete transparency on the use and just abuse shun of ppe, whether it is airbridge or through the commercial sector. Thank you mister gaynor. I just think its important to know because this was raised before the, i do not know if you answered this or if it was a question to you about how President Trump inherited the stockpile. The fact is that he found that stockpile. He should have been aware that it was not sufficient for three years. He cannot blame anyone other than his own administration for not heeding the warnings that a pandemic was coming and not making sure that we had the supplies that we needed of ppe well before march of this year, which is why project airbridge even had to be conceived. Thank you for your testimony here today. Mister chairman, i yield back. Gentlelady yields back. The chair recognizes the gentleman from north carolina, mr. Bishop, for five minutes. Thank you mister chairman. Mr. Gaynor, you have been emergency manager for a long time. As the morality of the American People in successfully responding to the pandemic in your judgment . Is the moral of the American Public . I believe so, yes sir. Do appeals to panic and recriminations advance your mission or make it more difficult . Panic does not help in any disaster, sir. Whether it is hurricane or whether it is covid19 response. If appeals to panic and recriminations are fed by misinformation and distortions, that is doubly so, isnt it . It makes the job a little bit harder, because not only are you trying to find solutions to those most in need, but you are trying to fight a narrative that sometimes is untrue. Do simplistic criticisms that alive the complexity of the situation that we are dealing with, to those help you are retired the effort that you are making . I guess i would have to hear how simple the interpretation of what we are talking about is, but i think facts, solid facts based on data and that is what we have been doing at fema. Data driven decisions based on everything that we know. Im not saying we know everything, but within the limits of our knowing, we make data driven decisions and it is our goal to make sure that data, facts drive the truth and the narrative. You testified in response to mr. Richardsons, sorry richmonds question that we have adequate testing in the United States and i am not sure if im recapitulate in your statement perfectly, but we need to maximize the utilization of it. I think, Something Like that. Would you, if you recall what im talking about, would you address that and elaborate . Yes sir. Early on when the testing, even before the testing blueprint was published, because i was the member of the white house Coronavirus Task force, we wanted to make sure that we knew of where all the testing platforms are in the United States. Every single one. From doctors offices, to universities, to colleges, to veterinarians, who had a platform that can do testing . Through a lot of howard work by a lot of talented people, we identified all of the testing platforms around the country and gave those to governors. And our goal was to enable governors to devise a Testing Program that fit their state and their needs. Not every state is equal. Cases are not equal. Hospitalizations are not equal. Icus and ventilators are not equal. Each state had its own unique demand on testing. Now, it is changed. We focused on new england and new york and new jersey a couple of months ago and now we are looking at the sun belt. I am not going to say that testing is not stressed in the sun belt because it is, but we provide resources to states to make sure they have enough to do that. I think it was announced a couple of days ago that the administration is producing testing machines for every single registered nursing home in the country. 15,400 testing machines to make sure we take care of our most vulnerable. Again, this is a dynamic situation. We adapt as we go. We learn as we go. If we had a shortfall, a mistake, we take that on board and we correct it. Emergency management and crisis and this historic covid19 response, no one has done this before. We learn as we go and i have 20,000 dedicated employees that work hard every day. There are 40 other agencies that are in support of fema and ageist us as we battle covid. Tens of thousands of dedicated employees out there they do the best thing. If we fall a little short, we will pick up and we will adjust and make it better than the next iteration. Thats how it works. Emergency management, response to the crisis is not a perfect game. We there will be mistakes made, we learn from them, we adapt and overcome and we will be successful, no doubt about it. In testimony earlier, the governor of illinois insisted that if we just use the defense production act, it could have just taken over everything, result all problems with respect to the ppe, is that true or false . I believe its false. Let me give you an example. I talked about the gpa. If you remember back, there was a large demand, still a large demand today, but it really large demand for n95 masks. When you ask the producers to make those, we did it. The material for n95 masks is the same material for gowns, so the result of making more masks is that you do not have enough material for gowns. You have to be thoughtful. Its not as simple as turning a light switch tomorrow its and 95 masks, it does not work that way. I want to be thoughtful about it and we want to make sure we know the system where, in some cases, where medical ppe is under stress. We use the d pa very deliberately we used it very precisely and we have Great Success stories, like ventilators to show for it. Thank you mister chairman. My time has expired. Thank you very much. Professor gaynor, your testimony to this committee is that we use the defense production act in a timely manner . Im not sure i use the word timely. Im saying we use the defense production act when we understood when and how to use it. Again, what i said before, do no harm. So, just to radically use it from day one, you do not know what the consequences are downstream. I understand what you are saying. We have to understand with our private partners, hey, if you do this, this other thing will suffer. Those conversations were going on with the administration, with task force, with fema, with eight pages, with d. O. D. , understanding if you do that, you may get a negative result on this. When we understood that hey, we will use dpa for the best result, then we executed it. So your testimony is that when the defense production act was used, it was used in a timely manner . Those are your words, mister chairman. I just explained how we used it. Im asking you that, in the execution of the prodefense production act, was it used in a timely manner . From my point of view, we used it when we needed to use it, when we understood the entire environment about the pros and cons of executing the dpa, whether it was title i, title three, title seven, we understood all of those things. Yes or no . My answer stands as an answer, sir. Okay. The chair recognizes the gentleman from california for five minutes. Thank you chairman thompson for holding this most important hearing. Our nation is failing in our response to covid19. Let me, if i can, talk a little bit about my district where, today, almost on an everyday basis, i begin to hear the names of individuals that i know are dying. I live in a hot spot, santa ana, anaheim, california the healthiest place on earth, disneyland has been closed for a number of months now. A lot of unemployment, a lot of people suffering, a lot of people dying. Mr. Gaynor, thank you for being here today. You mentioned that you are part of the covid task force, is that correct . Yes sir. Would you say that we are still learning about covid19, we just do not have enough data . The i mean, i think one of the members mentioned it, it is a novel disease. We are still learning . The little bit that we know of covid19, i mean, can we agree on some basic things like social distancing works, face masks work . Yes or. Im hoping we have a National Message that actually tells people that these basic things, the little bit that we know that face masks work because the confusion in my district folks dying, the Horror Stories i hear of people out there with no face mask, at social events. Its terrible. You mentioned do no harm, you mentioned watch out for unforeseen consequences and you also mentioned that we are still importing almost all of our ppe. You are on the Planning Task force for covid19. Can you tell me, when can we expect to be functionally supplied in this country . When can we manufacture for our own nations defends, ppe, enough ppe. My wife as a doctor, she came home two weeks ago and said, guess what happened last . I said what happened . Somebody stole my protective equipment. She delivers babies. He is around positive covid19 patients on a daily basis. When can we, sir, i expect to have america manufactured ppe for our population . When can we be there, sir . But yes, let me go back to the mass gangs. Its a yes or no. Do they help, yes or no . Please ask the question. You may previous statement i would just like to. I only have two minutes left. But wearing a mask, so, wearing a mask, the message i think we all want is that the mask really does not protect me, me wearing the mask protects you. Does wearing a mask help in a covid environment . Yes, sir. Thats all i want. But serve. Social distancing works. Hygiene, staying out of bars. Sir, im not trying to be argumentative. As a representative of my constituency, i want to, know, you are on the Planning Commission for covid19. When can we expect to have enough manufacturing of covid19 protection here in this country . I cant give you a date, sir. Again, its not a light switch. Speculate. Talk you talk about do no harm. Its about working answer my question. I dont get into an argument weve been working on increasing Industrial Production of ppe for months now. Again, its happening. I reclaim my time, thank you very much. As i look post covid19 this is like post 9 11. We are never going to go back to being the way we were before. We may have covid 20 ahead of us and im just hoping covid19 again teaches us that lesson that we forgot that we should have learned from ebola and zika. We are asleep with the wheel and this is not blaming anybody but i am trying to figure out, you are in that hierarchy at the top levels of planning for the next pandemic. Bad guys around the world and finally figured out a new way to hit us, and heaven forbid, heaven help us if somebody drops a dirty biological, a dirty barrel bomb on our country, we are not ready, and that is what you are telling me right now, mr. Gaynor. You dont know undertone you that, congressman, im not telling you are not ready. Reclaiming my. Time china again decides to lock down and not export ppe, where are we going to be . Please . So, first of all, sir, you know, i said in response to a member, that fema has never been more ready. And i said repeatedly does not just about throwing a bunch of money at ppe and having it all tomorrow, where we wanted, when we want it in the u. S. It takes time. In the last few seconds ago to reclaim my time. I would ask your question. Well, i look forward to getting the answer to your question in a written form and mister chairman, 15 seconds, i just want to say this, i do believe that covid19 has brought us to a new environment in the society. We have to plan for these kinds of attacks, either by Mother Nature or bad guys in the future and you are in fema and i hope and i pray to god that you are moving ahead to plan to protect this great country. Covid19 is not an attack, its disease, its a new disease that weve never seen. Thats what i, said its Mother Nature. Its much different from zika and ebola sober, comparing apples and oranges to this so tens of thousands of dedicated. They will overcome it, we take a date, but i guarantee we will have enough ppe made in america for the next crisis. When do you guarantee to have ppe ready . I just could not give you a day but the power of the american, public american industry in americans all, no doubt whatsoever. The chair recognizes gentlelady from new mexico, mystery small, for five minutes. Thank, you mister chairman. Thank, you Ranking Member. And thank you administrator gaynor for being here today for all of your work to try and stop the spread of covid19. In preparation for todays hearings, weve heard respecting the gao, from the former humid ministry under and from state officials and something i repeatedly heard was that because the administration was not able to provide a National Strategy to procure ppe medical supplies, state were left on their own to buy the supplies in that pitted states against each other, greeting unpredictable availability and crisis, and i appreciate you recognizing that in your Opening Statement, the same challenge when it comes to states having to compete to purchase. He is a problem for my home state in new mexico. These bidding wars that states were forced to partaken put smaller and rural states with less purchasing power in like new mexico, at a disadvantage. So, you testified earlier that your role is to help state and local governments if they have a deficit, and i deeply appreciate that. You also testified that you support a National Strategy for increasing Domestic Production of ppe and medical equipment, and i deeply appreciate that. You also believe the administration should implement a National Procurement strategy to address this National Emergency and make it easier for states to get ppe and medical supplies . But yes, and just to go back, we were in global competition for ppe, 150 more countries, every governor, every, mayor every tribal chief looking for the same exact, in global competition and where it was made was made in china where manufacturing was ramp down, and so we have a ways to go to make sure we have a relied Industrial Base not to, that can make ppe in america not just while we respond to covid, and this is the trick, we need to do that and support this industries for the long haul. Not just for a couple years, you can stay in business, can be competitive, you get ppe when you want. So we have to do that. Thank you. I do want to let you go back, and i wanted to make sure to ask a few more questions. I appreciate you watching a National Strategy for procurement as well seeking more producers domestically. Im focused on what we do moving forward. I really do appreciate your common that Emergency Management is not about production, its about getting better, and so moving forward, having a National Permit strategy as we see increasing cases again will be very helpful to Rural Communities like the ones i represent. I also wanted to shift after nine federal posture for tribes, really preaching the work of has done and spearheading the work that the man has done to support tribes. My state of new mexicos home to several tribes of pueblos and they have been disproportionately affected by covid19. In fact, as of may in new mexico, American Indians compose almost 57 of covid19 cases eve no and indians only account for 9 of the states population. New mexico is not unknown in wyoming, americans in his account really just 2 of states population and in arizona the numbers are 11 competitors 4 of the population. The minister gaynor, thank you so much for your actions to serve travel governments. Many travel governments requested a waiver of humans 25 non federal posture. Are you aware of those requests . I think i certainly understand that, and given the disproportionate impact on native american and sovereign government, have you recommended an increase in the current reimbursement level for travel Pandemic Response efforts. One of the things that we try to be considered about it is all the other funniness out there, and i mentioned before, i forget what the topic was, but schools, theres lots of funny out there, that maybe in this case a tribe could use that has more leverage. I literally my time just because for native american sovereign governments there was an incredible delay and getting the money that was out there for the cares act. This incredible delay and getting the money that was out there from the previous funding streams from the compromised in the early legislation and so now theyre being forced to spend that money very quickly before the end of this year. So there isnt money out there elsewhere and i hope you will consider reducing that share. So, its under consideration, the president has the final authority to approve cost sharing, so whether to something less than 75, 25, but we are in active conversations with the administration about how we actually become part of the problem, if you are familiar with how the disaster works, theres the beginning of the incident, and the incident so all of those considerations have to be taken into consideration so there is not an end date this and we want to be thoughtful and meaningful about how we get to an answer. Thank you very, much to recognize the gentleman from new york, mr. Roles. Thank you, mister chairman. Mr. Gaynor, ought to talk to you about a comment you made earlier, where you noted that lab capacity is that sufficient levels. Am i correctly phrasing what you said . For so, i think nationally, iphone based on where certain jurisdiction is. Of course. So, across the nation, if you take into account laboratory equipment, availability of religion, as a nation, we have enough infrastructure to test, its just a matter of where the testing is happening. Correct . Yes, that do our form is testing expert, based on that proposition and across the nation, or just allow for us to test . I have to defer, i mean, weve tested 15 million. Thats not were testing what 100,000 a day. I think we need more. I would argue that we need much more on a daily basis. So, the numbers are great, especially if you say 50 million, 50 million, while oh, my god. That is not enough. That is not enough. We need to test 20 Million People a day in this country so, when you come before us and you say that the capacities enough but then when i ask you what the capacity allows for us to test them and you say, i dont, know its difficult to continue the conversation because i wanted to talk to you but okay, if the capacities enough, how do we divert test . From one part of a country to another . Up to talk to you about swabs and the fact that we dont have enough swabs and they are glorified qtips and this is the greatest country in history of the world and why dont we have enough swabs, but my hope is that you can take our question seriously so if you tell us that we have enough infrastructure in this country, i, enough laboratory quid mint, and a free agents, i want to, know how much would not let us test . When i am not in charge of testing. Im not in charge of the details of specific, numbers of testing platforms, them, what im saying generally, there is testing capacity, it is stressed in locations that have increased cases, increase hospitalizations, there is no doubt about it. There is not a shortage of source swabs, not a shortage of media. So, then, what is the problem . If what youre saying is we will have particular hotspots in this country would not enough testing, whereas in other places, theres more than enough swabs, more than enough infrastructure, what is the problem . What are we doing well enough as a country . Like i said in the beginning, we learn as we go and where we started with 41 testing sites now we have 750. As the disease moves from an epicenter like new york in new jersey, to now where it is seated more differently across the sun belt, in virtually every county, it is different and so we will adapt as we go. One of the ways we are adapting is hhs and doctors who are another initiative is to purchase Rapid Testing for 15,400 certified. And those are good things. We learn as we go adapted we go. There was a good things, but you can see from our perspective that it is difficult to get a specific answer. What should our goal be as a country, how much has should we be doing every day . Again, im not a medical doctor. Our refer to dr. Jerome all those kinds of. Things our goal is to save lives in my suffering. That is our gold. So youre telling me that you are not, at your disposal, you do not have a National Target for testing. What im saying is, i am not in charge of national testing. Doctors who are from hhs is. And hopefully you can get him to explain in detail about the testing strategy, i know what our role from fema is about supplying material like swabs immediate governments to run their very unique testing. And youre saying we have enough swabs right now. Yes sir. We have ship 42 million swabs in less than three months and more media. How many more can you do . It depends on the demand. How many more can we do . We can do millions more. Could you do 100 million . Do you have a number . What is our capacity for swap production right now . I will happy to defer to hhs. Okay, so for all testing issues, go to hhs . Is that the point that you are making here . Other than what femas role is here today. What is femas role with testing . Shipping so that states can run their Testing Program. I just ask you, how many swabs can we ship in this country . I can tell you what we have shipped. But how many could we . That is my question. It is a basic question. Again, i would have to go to the supply chain. By the way, its an acceptable response to say you will get back to us. Im okay with that. What im not okay with is the hot potato here. Im trying to ask you a very simple. Theres no hot potato its just a matter of thats not my role. Its hhs role theres no hot potato here. I understand my time is up, but just to review the conversation, you said hhs. The question was answered. Hold on. Mister chairman, this is the third member of the democratic majority that has exceeded by some distance their time and questioning and persists and asking questions after their time has expired, not only let the witness finish their answer. Let me be clear, i have been very tolerant with every person who asks a question and i plan to continue. I will bear that in mind. Mr. Bishop, thank you for your diligence. I have been diligent. I will try to be better. Let me, just for the record, indicate that mr. Rose, we invited hhs to be a part of this committee hearing, so that we would not have the absence of information for testimony. The chair recognizes the gentleman from new york. Thank you very much mister chairman. I will take my mask off. I want to just start by saying thank you. This has been a once in a century pandemic that i set this country. There has been mistakes made, theres no question. Before we start pointing fingers, i just want to say thank you because we have done so much to try to get it right. It is not easy. There are mistakes, theres no question about it. I can tell you some bright spots. In my district, plastics manufacturer shut down his factory and one of his six locations and it is converting to a test manufacturing facility. By the end of this month, he will start producing 1 million tests a month. That is happening all over the country. They are responding to something and i credit what you say. It is a moving target. Things are changing quickly. We thought, up until recently that once you tested positive for covid, that, if you have the antibodies, you are okay. Now we are finding out the antibodies might not be lasting. We did not foresee that. So, there have been mistakes. Clearly, fema has made some mistakes. Clearly everybody has. Clearly we have. The bottom line is, i want to say thank you to all of the men and women that are on the front lines, like my son who is running a Testing Center for the National Guard. He puts his life on the line every day, and his kids life on the line. The fema people out there on the front lines trying to do the right thing. Thank you and thank you to everybody in the United States, everybody who has done their job and trying to fight this awful pandemic. I know nurses who have given up their jobs and careers and walked into Nursing Homes that have 100 to 150 positive patients and volunteer to go in there. There are so many Great American stories out there. I would like to just pause for a second and emphasize some of those Great Stories because thats what makes america great. Can we be better . Theres no question about it. So, lets keep it balanced here. Now, i just want to take a step back. Im sorry, i got here late. I do not know this question has been answered, but can you give me the status of what is going on with airbridge . Is it still going on . Are there still flights coming in . Whats going on with that . Yes sir and just to go back and thank you for saying that there are successes, but i would like to say the many more successes than there are mistakes or shortfalls. I want to be on the record with that understand, it is not a job that can commit oversight, so i commend my colleague from new york to probe. The bottom line is, lets keep the balance here. Lets keep on this. We have done tremendous jobs under unbelievable circumstances. No one had foreseen what has happened here. Just thank you. Thank you sir. Airbridge concluded with 249 flights around the 1st of july. They were bringing back critical supplies from china and other places to the United States. This was a, again, air bridge is a way to speed, accelerate those Critical Resources to frontline workers, so we can minimize lives and, or protect lives and minimize suffering. So airbridge has been sunset did. That time that we ran airbridge, it has allowed manufacturing overseas to catch up, to get more greater quantities on shipping container ships. That typical mode of transportation precovid on container ships is now more intact and more frequent and has allowed commercial producers to distribute more ppe across the country great. Going forward, i just want to ask you, what do you think we should be concentrating on to assist you in doing your job . What are some of the things that have not been done yet that maybe can be considered in the next package. I want to thank congress specifically for funding the Disaster Relief fund. This has allowed fema to fund ppe and staffing, alternate care sites, all those kinds of things that governors and mayors need. I thank you for fully funding that. You know, i think the challenge for fema right now, especially with the outbreak, the sun belt is making sure we have enough adequate staffing. Again, i took a tour of the gulf coast last week. The demand for ppe, we did hear that. The demand for ventilators, we did not hear that. The demand for alternate care sites or beds, we have not heard that. Really the demand is for medical professionals in hospitals to backfill those kinds of needs. 50 of all the cases now are florida, texas, california and arizona. So that is kind of our forecast. Getting volunteers from other parts of the country to go down and help, would be helpful to us to increase that bed with. Medical doctors, nurses, respiratory therapists, they are a high demand, low density asset. You have to be really careful about where you get them from. In some cases, you would say we will activate the National Guard, or activate the reserves, but those doctors that are in the reserves are doctors at hospitals today there is a delicate balance that we are trying to maintain, but right now, our concern is making sure we have enough medical professionals in those four states to deal with rising cases. You mentioned the Disaster Relief fund. Last i heard, and it was a while ago, but i know it was pretty well funded. 75 billion dollars in. Where are we at now with the fund . Yes sir. Congress appropriated about 45 billion dollars extra and this was in the beginning of our response. Weve spent about a billion dollars obligated so far. There is more to come. Again, expenditures lag. Also that fund has to be used in case there is a hurricane or whatever. Right. Its for covid response, Natural Disaster response, whether there is a hurricane or a tornado or flooding and it funds recovery across the country. So as far back as katrina, the fund is used for that. Thank you for indulging me, mister chair. I yield back. Thank you very much. Let the record reflect that you are one minute 30 seconds over. I was one minute 29 seconds. I did not call time on you. Thank you very much. Let me try to make this thing work. The chair recognizes the gentlelady from illinois for five minutes. Miss underwood. Thank you mister chairman. Mr. Gaynor, thank you for testifying today on the administrations response to this pandemic. As a former senior adviser, i know that a successful response to a global Public Health crisis of this scale requires a whole of government response, so clearly defined leadership. I would like to give a better understanding of how thiS Administration approaches that. Yes or no, is it your understanding that fema, as of today, is charged with leading the operational coordination for the federal inter each and see response to this pandemic . Yes maam. We are still leading the coordination for the response. So, is fema leading the federal response, but you report directly to the president on coronavirus matters . Can you say it again . Its very faint. I said with fema leading the response, do you report directly to the president for coronavirus matters . Yes maam. Both the president and the Coronavirus Task force. Absolutely. Okay, so according to your testimony, fema has been quote, coordinating the whole of government response, and quote, to the pandemic since march 19th. Let me be clear, fema employees have worked incredibly hard in the four months since, but the truth is that fema was not designed for this type of crisis. A pandemic that impacts every state simultaneously and lasts a year or longer is very different from a localized disaster, like a hurricane. In the four months that you led the response, have you asked the president for Additional Resources or support that you have not received . I disagree that we are not designed for this pandemic. I absolutely agree. Fema is designed exactly for this, which is inter agency coordination, so no matter if it is a hurricane or covid19, that is exactly what we do. We problem solve and we act and deliver solutions to those most in need. So, i disagree with your premise that this is not what we are designed for. In the second part of your question, again, i have trouble hearing what you are saying. In the four months since you have led the response, have you asked the president for any Additional Resources or support that you have not received . From the beginning again, i want to make sure that facts drive the narrative. The president and the Vice President and the Coronavirus Task force were very clear with me that anything i needed, whether it was a federal agency to respond, whether it is money, staffing, whether it is whatever i needed, it was at my disposal as we battle covid19 that was made clear explicitly by the president and the Coronavirus Task force when he declared a National Disaster on the 13th of march. Okay, so did you ask for anything that you have not received . Again, i have gotten, so i have great partners on the task force. From doctors who are on testing, dr. Hassan from fda, doctor birx who reads the data. I appreciate, we are familiar with the task force, or, im asking you if you have asked for something that you have not received no maam. I have gotten everything i have needed from the head ministration. Okay. So the coronavirus has been in this country for at least six months, and we still have ppe shortages i have a hard time the you said you have received everything you have asked for. I should not still be hearing about nurses reusing single use masks, yet they have gone on strike this month because they do not have the basic supplies they need to do their jobs. Yet, in your testimony, you write that fema is quote returning to a steady state. Dhs defined steady state as, quote, normal operations. You also write that femas role in the Coronavirus Response are moving to other agencies and that femas Coronavirus Task forces are being downgraded. With femas shutting responsibilities and moving back to normal operations, who in the federal government is taking over leadership of this ongoing crisis . Who is in charge of getting the testing where it needs to be . Who is in charge of making sure teachers going back to school have ppe . So, there is a lot and that question first of all, the president is in charge of the Coronavirus Response through the Vice President on the Coronavirus Task force, so the many members, including myself. We execute those priorities and those decisions. You know, i am not sure where the study state came from i think that maybe a little bit dated. They came from your testimony. This is a dynamic situation the changes from daytoday. I have many great partners, which include hhs. Its correct that some of the functions i have transferred back to hhs because it is more appropriate, because it is medical. Early on we adapted as we become more confident, we have better systems, better data, we understand the problem or. Some of those functions have shifted back to hhs. Let me be clear, fema is still in the operational lead for operational coordination where we are glued to the hip with my hhs brothers and sisters. We still meet every day on making sure we can deliver the resources to the nation, especially those that are most at risk and most under stress with covid19 cases and hospitalizations. Well, mr. , chairman i just have to tell you, mr. Gators testimony seem to death directly contradict his written testimony that he submitted. At the end of page, eight beginning page nine, he talks about fema returning to the steady state of normal operations and on the saying that they remain in charge of the operational response. I try to get a direct answer to this very straightforward question and like mister rose seem to be getting a bit of a loop circular response here. We are seeing almost 60,000 cases a day. Health care workers do not have the ppe that they need, and no part of our federal government can be in operations at this time. We need an aggressive coordinated response to can contain this pandemic and it has been lacking from thiS Administration. Yes, maam. Just to kind of follow up on some of your comments, this is an ever changing situation. Mr. Gaynor. You dont have to answer. Shes just making a comment. She was not asking you a question. The chair recognizes the gentleman from texas for five minutes. Thank, you mister chairman and thank you administrator gaynor for being here and for being so patient in the face of what are often disingenuous criticisms and accusations. A lot of questions, i think a lot of reasonable questions, but also a lot of the opposite and i would like to think that these hearings are about winning less in the construction of criticism and taking into account the imperfect results that are inevitable the face for once in a lifetime pandemic, it should not be about loving on falsified claims. Critics can never be wrong, how matter how much ppe was delivered, nomad or how many airbridge flights were flown, you cannot limit wasnt enough, and perhaps it wasnt, but if were going to do constructive criticism, the critics should point a pivotal decisions where everybody said, do this, and instead, you did something else. Ive never heard that criticism, interesting that we havent. Not having ppe in their hospital, those are certainly concerning claims, we were lucky in the houston area, we rarely hear that, if ever, do they have a direct line to fema . Is that how this works . Again, lets talk about, what is the proper Lesson Learned here. Are they ordering directly from fema, and if they dont get it to the call your hotline and requests their ppe. Or is that not how it works. Yes, sir, great question, so i will start with the premise that to be successful in an emergency, it has to be locally executed. I spent eight years as a local emergency manager analyst for years the state director. There is a system that we use it fema for Natural Disasters and its the same system that people were familiar with from the localized level, mayors and governors, tribal chiefs, if you need something from fema, we had a system designed to address that. I have ten regions across the country as far west as American Samoa and as far east as the u. S. Virgin island. Ten regional administrators, the tip of the sphere,. There is a need for hospital from ppe, they can contact their local government, and i can get through the pipeline. Understood. And when it comes to Nursing Homes, there was a priority of living ppe in Nursing Homes, delivering more than 29,000 packages of supplies, in 53 states and territories. We saw the vulnerabilities in Nursing Homes. In hindsight, is there anything more fema could have done to stop governors in say, new york, michigan, colorado from putting infected patients into confined nursing home facilities . We know in hindsight that was a terrible idea. Yes, sir. Im not a medical doctor, so i will leave the medical considerations out about what you do with patients that have to those that have an empty at the end of their name. But we do it fema. I dont know whats so funny about . That is not funny, people died because of that decision. What we do it, fema matter if it is covid19 or it is a hurricane, is we support elected leaders so whether you are a governor or mayor, and you have a disaster, a fully enable you to execute what you need to do in your specific estate or locality. Not federally managed, not really executed. Citizens we unable governments through variety of different systems to include funding, materials, technical assistance, to address those needs by their constituents. And talk to me about project airbridge. Is a success . Is it a failure . What could be done better with it . Yes, sir. It was an absolute success and again it was about speed, and at the direction the president , go find every piece of ppe around the globe bringing tonight states, Pretty Simple mission order. We have a pretty vast logistics arm, we used planes in both before to transport material to disaster sites and this allowed time, so we can build an Industrial Base, get more produced onshore, find more confident foreign produces that we can rely on, and again get that specific ppe to where it is needed most, those frontline workers, nurses, doctors, caregivers, cnn is in Nursing Homes where him out of the most so it was about saving lives and minimizing suffering. That was ultimately what it was all about. Thank you. I yield back. Thank you very much. The chair recognize the gentleman from michigan miss looking for five minutes. Thank, you mister director, thank you for being here and thank you to you and your workforce for the really unprecedented challenge that we have ahead of us, and that weve been dealing, with that we still have ahead of us. Im glad to see there is wide bipartisan agreement that the idea that we were buying and over beryl with the chinese government, the fact that im negotiate for 78 tenth mask with a chinese middleman in the middle of china means the chickens have come home to roost and the state does the most manufacturing of just about any of them, you can talk about this is the eighties, not long before this crisis, and certainly because of gm and for what they did to invest in ventilators, we know personally how hard it was to get the administration to use the epa, im glad theyre using it now. But if my colleagues are interested in doing something to make sure youre not in a situation again or in future pandemics, there is a bipartisan bill, strengthening american Strategic National stockpile act so we can actually not just use the deep which should be an Emergency Authority but incentivize American Companies to want to make the supplies for you all so im glad were in strong agreement on that. Let me just ask you about testing. You have briefed us on march 20th, april 17th, may 8th, and again today, and each time, i believe you have said we have the supplies we need for everyone who needs a test. And as someone from michigan morey went through a really strong march in april was where our wave was and now watching my peers go through this, is it your testimony that since march 20th, everyone who is needed a test has gotten access to a test unless there was a local implementation problem . Again, i would defer to testing and details to the doctor. Again, our role is to enable governors like Governor Whitmer to enable her to run this progress for a state. So is your testimony that you got her all the reagent and all the swap that she needed for every test that was required by the state of michigan . So i cant say 100 , but i can say i can give you details of what exactly what we delivered to each state, swabs in media, and so each, just a step back, through the admiral and his engagement with state some governors, had to get you with every single state governor about testing and their goals, designed whether testing percentage of gold needed to be by state and then with supplies, swabs and media, applied that number to the program. If a governor exceeded their goal, then we had enough slack in the supply chain to give, in this case, more. I have to go back over the record did she meet her goals or did she exceed her goals . It does feel like, especially as we look at other parts of the country having the same problems that we had early on that it feels like passing the buck and we cannot just learn from our experience. There is no way that you can still say as you did on march 20th that we have all of the materials we need to test everyone that we needed to test. Then, in april, in may and now today. You do not have to answer that, its just hard to think ahead to another wave. Thats my next question, sir. My next question for the state of michigan. We are watching our peers have the same problems in texas, alabama, arizona that we went through. Im asking your question as a planner. Are you curry only planning for a second wave in the states that got hit hard as the first round . Are you talking about chicago, detroit, new york, new jersey, pennsylvania. There was constant planning and strategizing about what the next 30, 60, 90 days look like. That is what we do. Right now, we are looking at whats closest to us in front of us is those four states. Phase one. Well, it is wave 1. 5, right . We thought we would have a little lull between august, sorry july in august and that did not happen. Again, we are dealing with what is in front of us right now. I guess the question is, help me understand and explain to the public that what happened to us with the shortages on ppe is not just going to keep happening again in the second way for places like michigan. I think time makes ppe better. We have just recently completed with the supply Chain Task Force, we actually went out to z to them one to one about how much ppe do you have on hand . I will just speak in general terms, not every state is equal, but for the most part, the majority of states have 60, 90, 120 days of ppe stockpiled in their state warehouses. That is a really good sign. Im not saying that is the ultimate solution, we still have to work on making sure we have enough in the national stockpile. That is a whole another initiative. There is lots to do and we need to ramp up production so we can have bigger numbers. There are lots of facets to this, but i think we are in a much better position today than we were on march 20th when it comes to ppe. Again, every day, we get a little bit healthier because we have done all of these initiatives along the way. So, i have confidence that we will have enough ppe for today and for, if there is a second wave in the fall. Thank you mister chairman. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentleman from missouri for five minutes. Thank you mister chairman. Thank you for being here, administrator i appreciate your presence and so forth, i think it is good and i know your job is hard. In april, fema published a new civil rights book entitled ensuring civil rights during the covid19 response. The bulletin went on to emphasize femas legal and moral obligation to deliver covid19 pandemic relief and Disaster Assistance to communities irrespective of race, color, religion, national origin, sex and so forth. In spite of your welcome bulletin on civil rights, covid19 disparities remain. So, im not saying you are doing anything deliberately, well i do not even want to almost adjust it, because that would be irresponsible for me, but what i want you to address as best as you can, please is do you think that the agency is doing enough of the right things that you will reduce the disparity between the people of color who are disproportionately affected by the pandemic . What else can you do . Is there something that you should be addressing and sending to the public or those who are out fighting this deadly disease . Yes sir, thank you for the question. So, i have been an emergency manager for a few years now, about 13 years. Every level of government. What i have learned is that all the challenges Community Faces before a disaster, whether it is poverty, homeless, unemployment, the disaster and you can use covid19 as the disaster, makes it all worse. It lays bare where the gaps are. I think that is where we are in some of these communities. I understand there has been a longstanding inequities in health care access, service and outcomes, but let me tell you what fema is doing to try to offset some of these disparities. Again, thank you for mentioning the equal rights bulletin its actually the first time we have ever issued one of these for a disaster and i think probably it is going to be stand in fear. I appreciate that too, sir. 56 major disasters on monday, march 13th we have never been here before. We focused on things that are in our authority and things like food, help with food. We have a program where we can use staff money to provide feeding in a lot of innovative ways. I will use a couple of examples. In california, using meals on wheels to deliver food to those that cannot get out of their home, who are covid positive. We have never done that before. We want to try to be innovative. Things like housing. Homelessness in california, getting them off the street and putting them in a non congregate sheltering, if they are positive, again, to drive down the curve on covid. Testing sites. 750 or so testing sites today. 70 of those testing sites are in socially vulnerable communities. That is deliberate, that is not by accident. I give great credit to my partners at hhs for driving that. We continue to do those things, just like Everything Else we can do much better and we look for every opportunity to do so. Okay, thank you. My final question. Its personal, but its not because i think there are millions of people who want to ask you the same question if they were here. I have a grandson who is five years old, a granddaughter who is seven, almost seven. I have to tell you, administrator, i am scared to death for them to go to school in a few weeks. I mean, how, what can i tell my daughter and my son . What can i tell my wife . And what can i tell my constituents when they want to know how can schools open safely if they cannot get ppe . Yes sir. I will use the mitigation fundamentals that work, no matter if it is a school or it is here testifying at congress. It is all the things that matter. These mitigation fundamentals work, no matter where you are. We have seen that across the country. First is wearing a mask. Right . Drive the transmission down by wearing a mask and have someone across from you wearing a mask. You wear your mask, not for yourself, but to protect the person across from you. That is one. Next is hygiene and hand washing very simple things. You know, every time i walk by a alcohol pump, whether need to wash my hands or not, i do it today just because it is good habit. Do not wear rubber gloves, it does not help with transmission. Actually, it goes against transmission, so just do not wear rubber gloves. Keep your hands clean. Then, social distancing. Stay away six feet and we are all doing it here today. Lastly, do not go into bars and do not go into crowded places, like over clouded dining rooms. If the American Public can do all those things, we will crush the covid wave today. Okay. Thank you mister chairman. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentleman from texas for five minutes. Thank you mister chairman. I thank the witness for appearing today. Mister administrator, you are former military person, is this correct . Lieutenant colonel . Do you believe in china command . Absolutely, sir. Respected. Yes, sir. It is one of our core values. Mr. Administrate, i will come back to this, ill come back to this at the end my questions i say this is a heartfelt state with no desire to dominion anyway. When you say earlier that we will overcome it and youre talking about the virus, we will overcome it but mr. Minister, at what cost . That is the question. Harris county, texas, going to be intelligence i have a few days ago, 37,000 cases. 545 deaths. July 20th, 2020, as it relates to the country i, love the United States of america, 3. 9 million cases, 143,000 deaths. At what cost . News article, texas tribune. July 20, fifth 2020. 85 babies under one year old in this county have tested positive for coronavirus. And this is since mid march. And then it goes on to say that a baby younger than six months old died. I want cost . What cost . We have a president who has talked about injecting persons with disinfectant, who has indicated that the virus will simply disappear. A president who wont wear the mask that you just said we ought to wear. I respect you and i believe you are sincere, but when the president of the United States of america wont wear the mask that you and i know will protect people and save lives, you have to ask us, at what cost. Lieutenant colonel, i respect you. I appreciate you done for your country but the question is, at what cost . How many lives . How many more . . What is wrong with this man . You and i know that masks protect people, and its just yesterday that he seems to have come around. Now, back to the chain of command. I expect you to do what youre doing, to be quite candid with you. You are a marine. Once a marine, always a marine. You have to do what you do. This is how the country functions, so i appreciate you but i just want you to know, that the cost is too high. Its too high, for minorities. Its too high, in houston texas, where have a community known as sunnyside, one of the hotspots. What areas are the people who drive the trucks, they pick up the trash, the day the groceries. Im talking about latinx, im talking about african americans, the cost is too high. This is why i came to the hearing. I want to thank the chairman for having the hearing, and i appreciate what you said, because i agree with you. We will overcome it, but the question, is at what cost, and its a rhetorical question that you need not answer, my dear brother. I hope you are not offended by me saying, my dear brother. There is only one, raise human, and we are related. But at what cost . You need an answer. A elect balance of my time. The chair recognize the gentlelady from new york for five minutes, miss clark. I thank you very, much mister chairman, and administrator gaynor, i am pleased that you have joined us today. However, i am not pleased by the administrations deadly mismanagement of this pandemic. Hundreds of thousands of americans have died. Countless more businesses have shuttered, because of the governments failure to address this crisis with the appropriate amount of urgency and to this day, and to this day the urns he has not risen to meet the level of distress and destruction that this pandemic is wreaking across this nation. Id like to turn to the strategic top stockpile. The Strategic National stockpile is a nation supply of lifesaving pharmaceuticals and medical supplies we use in a Public Health emergency. Throughout the pandemic, it is triple the stockpile has moved back and forth among cdc, hhs and fema. In march, control of the stockpile was transferred for major just a fema and in late june, control revert back to hhs. So, administrator administrator gain, or could you please explain why control of the stockpile has shifted multiple times, and how does fema continue to support the Strategic National stockpile . Yes, thanks for the question. So, just to be clear, again, fema was never do the best of my knowledge, in recent history, the owner of the Strategic National stockpile. You are correct, ownership had been between cdc and asper. It now reside under the control of asper, the secretary for preparedness in response under secretary azar at hhs. So, just to be clear, we dont know why they keep shifting the control of the stockpile between hhs. I dont, and again i would defer that question to the secretary. Okay, no problem. At a White House Press conference on april 2nd, jared kushner, speaking about the Strategic National stockpile said the notion of the federal stockpile was, around the notion of mineral the notion of the federal stockpile was, it is supposed to be our stockpile. It is not supposed to be the states stockpiles that they then use. This directly contradicted the description of the stockpiles purpose on the website, and shortly thereafter, the text on the website changed to benefit mr. Kushners remarks. Administrator gaynor, what is your understanding of the purpose of the Strategic National stockpile. From a general understanding of the stockpile, we are now building the next version of, that the destination stockpile, but it was not designed for a pandemic of the scale, it was really designed for, as i understand, it for an anti act attack, it was really used. So, my question is, what is the purpose . Not what hes excuses. I think the traditional purpose in the way it was designed for is again a biological attack in a city and so the stockpile has many Different Things and i include pharmaceuticals and vince and ppe and it really was and is designed to buy time, get that self out the door until you can ramp up production, and generally in an interact scenario, and then you get it through the normal channels but again, not designed for covid19, it could not be used as a Single Source for all things ppe across the country, and its one of the reasons we designed the air bridge. Thank you for your response. Thank you for your response, administrator. On april 27th, as the virus spread to more than 900 and more than 900,000 individuals in the United States, killing one 54,000 americans, dr. James maloney, a pulmonologist, died of complications related to covid19. The doctor worked for more than 30 years at the state medical center, and underfunded, publicly financed hospital that served my district in brooklyn, new york. Doctor mahoney was set to retire and then the pandemic struck. Doctor mahoney ran into the fire, continuing to care for patients battling covid19. Like other hospitals that served economically disadvantaged communities, the hospital where doctor mahoney worked, did not have enough ppe as the virus spread this occurred back in april. It distresses me to see my colleagues pulling the same exact trauma here we are three months later going into the fourth month. Doctor gaynor, the failure of the administration to provide ppe to hospitals, to nursings homes, particularly those serving economic disadvantaged communities. Amongst its consequences, the loss of many dedicated frontline workers. What specific steps are being taken, if any, to ensure that frontline workers receive the supplies they need to fight the ongoing pandemic . Yes maam. Again, our, we are built as Emergency Management agency with our priority goal to save lives and minimize suffering. With you, i agree that one life lost as one life to many. So, you know, it is an indiscriminate disease, it knows no borders, it knows no boundaries. It does not care what you look like or your from. Just to go back on making sure that we have enough ppe to protect our frontline workers. That has been the goal from the beginning to go back on further statements about global competition not just in the u. S. , but across the globe everyone is from the same, exact item, like the n95 masks and we were not managing an abundance of resources, we were managing it fema the lack of resources and making hard decisions about priorities about where these very limited, at the time, very limited resources go to do the best to save lives and minimize suffering. Those decisions were made at the highest level within fema. My partners on the unified Committee Group at fema, we agonized over all of those decisions about where the events go, where does ppe go . Again, no small task hard decisions to make. Our goal was to make sure that we had ppe where it was needed the most and that remains our goal today we are in a much better place today than we were in march or april. Mister chairman, i know that my time is expired, but this has been an abysmal selling for anyone to try to justify the lack of urgency and the lack of continued preparation for this pandemic across this nation and a justified by saying that we are managing the best way we can, this is unexpected we know what we are dealing with now thiS Administration continues to fail the American People at the cost of lives and livelihoods. I yield back mister chair thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentleman from nevada for five minutes thank you mister chairman. Administrator gaynor, you and i represent lost vegas and we have a mask requirement and we close and are open gradually, and now we are seeing a spike in cases. I want to ask you a couple of questions about that. And you are probably aware that the state of nevada made a title 32 extension request. We sent that in on july the 9th. We will continue to use our nevada National Guard for the mitigation activities, they have done a great job and we need to continue that i have a letter from the governor and an Additional Support letter from the entire delegation, asking for this extension. With unanimous consent, mister chairman, i would like to enter these into the record. Toward or. Thank you very much. Right now, our use of the National Guard is to end in august i wonder if you have any idea when we will hear from you when we will know if that is going to be able to be continued. What is the status of that request . Yes maam. Thank you for the question. I cannot say i have seen that exact letter from nevada, but we will make sure that we have that. Many governors has asked for and extension past august 21st we have been discussing that at the administration, d. O. D. And fema and hopefully we make a decision here shortly because i think we all know how valuable the National Guard has been in helping governors across the country do many things, heroic things as a valuable asset, we want to ensure that we appropriately due to get all of those requests. Hopefully shortly, we will have a decision from the administration. I hope it is a positive one, because they have been very helpful and we would like to see them continue to do that as these cases increase. My second question goes back to the issue of test kits. We have been getting mixed responses from the administration in this area, like in so many others first we were told that they would be provided by the federal government. I think the cdc coordinated by eu through june the 30th. Then, on july the 4th, we got word of nothing. Mr. Rosa furred to most of this, do not worry, we will be continuing them through the end of the year, through january the 1st. We really need these test kits. I wonder if you can give me any more specifics. Are they going to be continued . Do we need to provide our own test kits . Yes maam, when you say test kits, again, i would defer, different machines and different requirements. Generically, fema is requiring testing supplies, swabs and media to governors. This is a specific ask from nevada about a specific kind of kit, i will engage a judge as if there is a shortage that we need to correct or adjust. Thank you. It is not at all now that we are in july. Yes maam. Production is much greater than it was 90 days ago. Well then, for just kind of more general question yesterday i joined some of my colleagues, the chairman on the transportation committee. I have asked you about this before and i will ask you about this again. We are very concerned about a number of vacancies at the top level in fema, especially as we try to deal with and coordinate and figure out and take charge of what is going on with the pandemic. On top of that, now we are into Hurricane Season and it looks like this is going to be a pretty vicious season. What is happening with these different positions . Are you feeling them . Can you not find people . Are you covering it all by yourself . Can you give us some idea . Yes maam. In general, just on, so a couple of different categories of vacancy. Generally, vacancies across fema, we have hired from the past six months, actually from a fiscal year from october to now, we have hired 22 more people than we have hired ever before. We onboarded more people in the past several months then we have done historically, which is a great sign. We have done that well responding to covid19. Through virtual onboarding and teleworking, it has been quite amazing. Vacancies on career as edss, as of today, there was only one vacancy for on ses at out of about 105 or so sess. The rest either have selected individual or in the process of selecting individual again, we have never been in the spot before. We virtually have had no career vacancies. We are pretty proud of that. The last category is politicals. So, i think we have lost some politicals. Dan canoe ski, who ran resilience resigned in january, as of the person in operations. We continue to fill a political response, career spots, continue to do hiring. Again, the pool of talent that i have at fema is quite breathtaking. I have no lack of confidence about our ability to perform and respond to covid19 or a hurricane or anything in front of us. We have never been more ready as an agency. That is a belief i take with me, having worked through covid19 response over the past 140 days or so. So you feel like you have enough of a Senior Leadership team to make some of these key decisions that we have been asking about through the course of this year . Yes maam. We have been making decisions. Again, where there was a vacancy, we designed to have deputies again, i will put up any one of my politicals or careers against anyone else when it comes to talent and dedication and enthusiasm for the mission. They have been out performing even my expectations. I think we, obviously we need a couple more politicals and we will work on that, but i think as an agency as a whole, we are in a really good spot. Mister gaynor, i know you are a professional. I think you are doing a good job, but in some of these agencies, we see people appointed who come to the agency that they try to get rid of and they were in congress and they come to the agency from an industry that they are supposed to regulate so when you talk about having politicals, i hope you look for experts who know how to handle this problem. And you will make some policy decisions based on science and good prices management. Not just on somebody who is a friend or a connection, or has a business interest with mr. Kushner. Maam, i cannot speak more highly of the political is that i work with today. Absolutely talented Emergency Managers. Never worked with a greater bunch, whether that they here now or like lamb better men or women that i worked with here at fema when it comes to politicals. I yield back. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentlelady from new jersey. Thank you mister chairman and thank you mr. Gaynor for your testimony today and for the hard work that you are all doing i want to share some information that i have. We have talked about the fact that we are at this place and we are doing the best we can trying to catch up with things as we move, but the understanding i have is that we had an indication that we have a problem as far back as november of 2019 even though the president refused to deal with any of this information, we knew that this was coming and we knew that we were given this information, even in his daily briefings as early as january. I also want to take note of the fact that there were independent Research Studies done, won by Colonial University and won by another organization that said had we implemented social distancing guidelines as far back as march 1st, we would have possibly decreased the death rate from covid between 80 and 90 so, it is not like we did not have earlier information upon which to act. I know that my colleagues on the other side had asked you questions like, are there appeals to panic and recriminations . Is that in any way having an impact on how our citizens are reacting to the space in which they are living in right now . What about the confusions that may have been shared between what the experts are saying and what the administration is saying . My question is, well how about the conflicts and the lying that have been shared from the white house and the head of the task force . The Vice President of the United States. You all said that you make your decisions based on facts and data. Your data driven decisions. I want to ask you a couple of responses to things that the president of the United States has said and you tell me whether or not they are or are not true. On may 8th, the president said that the coronavirus will go away without a vaccine. Mr. Gaynor, yes or no, was that true . I, theres something about a vaccine. I did not hear the whole question. On may 8th, the president said the coronavirus, and i quote, will go away without a vaccine. Is that yes or no . Do you believe that, yes or no . Again maam, i think the administration is working hard. I just need you to say if this is going to happen. Im not asking you to defend the administration with this incompetence. I want you to answer my question, yes or no or i dont know . I think this question deserves more than a yes or no answer. I do not really care what you think it deserves. This is my time that i am reclaiming and i need you to say yes, no or i dont know. Yes maam what i would like to say is that the administration works hard to identify therapeutics and vaccines. So then, are we going to acknowledge the fact that it needs a vaccine . Yes maam. The administration, nih is rolling on. I reclaim my time from you. I reclaim my time. On june the 17th, President Trump said the coronavirus is, and i quote, dying out. Is the coronavirus dying out right now, mr. Gaynor . Yes or no . I think if you look across the country, it ebbs and flows. The epicenter in margin april was is it dying out is my question. It was in new york in new jersey, detroit, chicago, los angeles, washington state. Now we are seeing spikes all over, but more in the west and in the south. If the answer, is it yes or no . Why are you finding it so difficult to say what you are seeing . Yes or no. Again maam, i think your questions deserve an answer that is more than yes or no. Let me just ask you this im just here trying to share the facts as i know them. At one point, the president of the United States said, anybody that wants a coronavirus test can get a test. Is that true . Can anybody that wants a coronavirus test get one right now . I will tell you my own experience. I was just on the gulf coast. Yes or no . You are at the head of this outrage and support to the states and the communities, you know the answer to the question. Im trying to give you a real life example. I was on the gulf coast last week. I do not want an example, i want to answer. I travel to louisiana, traveled to mississippi and i traveled alabama. I came in contact with a this is almost a futile interaction between you and me. Let me just put one more question out there and you can say whatever you want to say with a little bit of time i have left. Because the president said on june the 8th, so we want the continued lock down and for the states. We have some members, or some ashes, or we may have some flames coming up, but we will put them out. We will stop them out. We understand the snow. We will stop them out and we will stomp them out very powerfully. Have we stomped out these embers or ashes of the coronavirus . Man, im sure that you can see across the nation, there are hotspots. Places like florida and texas woo, ian, arizona, california that have flared up. If you look back to march and april, to new york, new jersey, connecticut, rhode island, those states have it under control. Again, this is a dynamic situation. It changes from day today mitigation works. Thank you sir. This requires leadership, no question about it. We are doing so well in new jersey because my governor sought spiking up just a tiny bit and he delayed the opening of certain businesses. We definitely need leadership, something that we have not had from the president of the United States let me just a say in closing, and mister chairman i will yield back. When i listen to where you are and what fema has had to deal with. When i have listened to how this country in general, this leadership has responded to this pandemic and failing to keep our hundreds of thousands and even millions of citizens safe or alive, i do not believe that you are ready for the coronavirus that is going to take place for the Hurricane Season and the devastating season that we are about to have. I want to say to you that you need to ask for what you need. You need to understand what you need, which i think you do, mister gaynor, but you need to be bold enough to ask for it and you need to be bold enough to let us know whether or not you are getting it. With that, i yield back. Thank you. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentlelady from california for five minutes. Thank you mister chairman for holding this important hearing. Administrator, when did fema, when did you get involved in fema and the coronavirus . Was that roughly around the end of january . Are you asking when did fema get involved with the virus response . When were you brought in to help fema with the Coronavirus Response . We have been partnering with hhs early february and then on the 10th of february you answered my question, i appreciate that. I have a series of questions i want to get to. I would just like to more fully answered. We were in support of aj says on the 10th of february, send over 30 fema experts in logistics, planning, coordination. Mister administrator, i want to reclaim my time. She is fine with your answer. Mister administrator, thank you. Roughly in february. February 10th, exactly. I understood thank you sir. So my question is about march. In march, the u. S. Government found 1. 5 million n95 masks sitting in a warehouse in indiana and the department of Homeland Security had to decide what to do with these masks did you play any role at all on where these masks would go . I am not familiar with this story, maam okay, well in march, Homeland Security had 1. 5 million n95 respirator masks. They had to decide where to go, the Homeland Security did not send them to the hospitals and frontline workers across the country. At the end of the day, they decided to tenants send these masks to tsa and cbp and other places, instead of our hospital workers and our hospitals that really need it. Very unfortunate. I was hoping to hear that you, who was at fema would have advocated to have access to those masks and to have advocated to have those go to our harder hit hospitals. Although im on familiar with the story, i would say that. She has to finish she had not finished answering her question. Mister administrator, i want to move on to femas help with california on housing. First of all, i want to thank fema for working with california on providing housing and those who really needed shelter during covid19. Fema has committed to reimburse 50 to 75 of expenses for sheltering in temporary housings through the Public Assistance Program category p. One of the problems however is, fema is waiting way too long to let the state know if the program will continue to be funded, so they cannot plan for the next month is there anything fema can do to speed up the process and letting the state know whether the funding will continue, so they do not get left with a large bill and not having the assistance of fema . Yes maam. I do not know the specifics of this, but to date, we have obligated 1. 1 billion dollars to california. I am not sure where the holdup is on getting that money out the door from the state. We have run our programs on reimbursement, so you actually have to spend money before you get money from the federal government. If there is a specific issue, locality issue, i would be happy to connect with you and your staff on that item. I will follow up, thank you. There are instances were local governments have been waiting for years to receive fema reimbursement, so i definitely will follow up. It does not sound just at all. The states need to be able to plan on when fema is going to continue the partnership mister administrator, conventional Disaster Response strategies, such as congregate sheltering and volunteering recovery and supply, Distribution Efforts require reexamination during the pandemic. Administrator, how is fema working to prepare sheltering guidance with the need for individuals to socially achieve . Or to have social distancing, im sorry. In the beginning of mine just simone e. , i share with everyone that fema created the covid19 pandemic operational guy for the Hurricane Season. It has the title hurricane on the front cover and it can be applied to any National Disaster or any incident the lessons in their apply to all. Things like more space for sheltering having been a local emergency manager for almost seven years and then a state director, the responsibility for managing sheltering is on the local official, local mayor owns that responsibility. Again, i go back to how this system of Emergency Management works. Locally executed state managed and federally supported. We provide technical assistance, if needed, to states and locals if they need extra planning considerations, but the guidance is out there. Its best practice for many different agencies, including cdc about how to adapt your traditional sheltering challenges to covid19 response. Those resources are out there. Theres actually an exercise program where locals can test their plans to make sure that the assumptions that they have made for dealing with covid19, again, for sheltering or evacuation, holds up when nationally put to use that is how the program works. Thank you administrator for your attempt to answering questions it has been a little frustrating in her inability to provide specifics or your ability to answer dirt questions directly. You were involved in fema in february, the number of deaths were not that high at that time because of, this trumpS Administrations failure and really the failure across the board, the lack of leadership has led to over 135,000 americans being dead. That is just not a flareup in certain parts. It is a continued failure in not having a National Strategy. With that mister chairman, i yield back. Thank you very much. The chair recognizes the gentlelady from florida for five minutes. Thank you so much mister chairman, administrator gaynor. Thank you so much for being with us today. I also want to begin by thanking you and the men and women who work with you for the work that you do every day to get us through some very tough times. I have to say that this has been pretty exhausting for me. As a first responder, i have worked out in the field with female on many occasions. To listen to my colleagues on the other side of the aisle think that this would be one of the areas that we could get our act together, but to hear my colleagues on the other side of the aisle focus more on defending the inaction of our president then on the 141 plus thousand americans who have lost their lives to covid19. I was also pleased to hear them say that facts matter. That solid facts, based on data are important because we know that the president is the biggest defender. ThiS Administration, unfortunately is always looking for a villain to blame. Americas response could have been better had china allowed us to have a better response. But then, as we look at other countries, somehow other countries were able to find their way to being better able to control the virus and save more lives, despite chinas actions. Administrator gaynor, how would you explain that . I am not sure i understand the question, but what i can tell you from my point of view is my job and the role of leading the federal coordination for operations is to make sure that the full weight of the nation, all departments with all the things that they bring to the table, like d. O. D. , the National Guard, and hhs, we maximize those. Again, and ive said it time and time again, to prevent loss of life and suffering. My role is to prevent loss of life and suffering. You said earlier, to protect the lives of the American People, the health and safety of the American People. That is what you said, right . Thats what i just said not what your job is, but how do you protect the health and safety of the American People . In many different ways i will use give me three how do we do that as we respond to covid19 . How do you, as the fema administrator, protect the health and lives of the American People . So the first example i will give is the initiative to create more ventilators in the United States so when we first took over operation coordination in the stockpile, there are about 16,000. To create more ventilators. I would just like to tell you the success of the story. 16,000 ventilators and today to make sure we have enough equipment. What is number two . By september, we will have 110 ventilators in the stockpile, by september. Okay. You said that this was a global competition for personal Protection Equipment. Is that not correct . Absolutely. But yet, we have seen bidding wars between states, the federal government and other countries. Since this is a global i disagree with that premise. Since this is a global competition, isnt that the reason why we would need a federal response in terms of, as opposed to allowing states to basically fight for themselves or fend for themselves . Again, i think having been a state director, i think i would do the same. You have worked at the local, state and federal level. Just using my experience, i think one of my goals and we are just talking about ppes, just to get as much ppe as i could, even if i did not need, it because i was not sure what was going to happen next. My role, again at the direction of the president. What is the decision to leave it to local jurisdictions . To look at best practices, as fema taken the knicks to live to look at best practices through any states who are doing it better than others and maybe give guidelines to states who were struggling . We have. We have engaged and maybe mr. Earlier, but we have engaged with every single state when it comes to ppe. Have you developed, you have looked at best practices the you said you are doing a better than others and you are stating guidelines . Absolutely. Finally, mr. Gaynor, let me just say this, i am from florida you know the situation in florida. Yesterday, we added 9000, over 9000, 9400 new covid19 cases. So, based on your many years of Emergency Management experience, at the local state and federal level, because i heard a conversation earlier about people panicking and all of that when the president uses fear every day to keep my colleagues on the other side of the aisle from doing their jobs. But, anyway. What message would you send to florida when you look at those numbers and what is going on in florida . I will go back to the fundamentals. Masks work. Where you mask, do not wherever yourself, where for the person thats across from you. Keep your hands clean. Every time you walk by and alcohol dispenser, clean your hands. Do not wear rubber gloves, it does not help, it makes things worse. State of bars, stay out of crowded restaurants and use social distancing. Finally, administrator if you look at the overall, the nations overall response to covid19, what grade would you give . I dont do grades. Historians and after action reports can greatly. You feel like you have done a good job in the nation has done a good job and responding . I think all of the hardworking career men and women. We know they work hard. I did not celebrate until the numbers went down. Do you believe that this nation has done a good job . Im talking about the hard work that everyone has done. Mister chair, i yield back. The gentlelady yields back. The chair recognizes to the record the gentlelady from texas. Miss chairman, thank you for your kindness and indulges and making mention of Tony Robinson in region six the Texas Division of Emergency Management state situation report that shows increasing number infected abc news, 13 states now report coronavirus texting issue and that is texas unanimous content Texas Medical Center talks about the lack of beds and icu and staffing, has unanimous consent doctor person, margins the management of the city of houston begging for the extension of National Guard and more testing again in the state of texas in houston the trump, article july 20th, more covid19 testing creates more cases, we did the math and, of course, the final document, covid19 cases due to increased prevalence this is on the website in texas i will work with them about it, but it tells people that they have to pay and then discourages people thank you mister chairman for your indulgence infighting to save lives a yield back without objection, the chair recognizes the gentleman from mississippi for five minutes thank you mister chairman. Mr. Gaynor, i want to thank you in the men and women that served under you and your written testimony. You talked about the fact that you all are doing a very difficult job and in really unprecedented times. You say that we are currently under 114 concurrent, major disaster declaration. One for every state in the union, five territories are also under major disaster declarations you also talked about the seminal tribe of florida and the district of columbia. I know in mine and the chairmans home state of mississippi that there have been five federal declaration since january of this year. We currently have a pending declaration that we are working on approval on that. I know you had the chance to visit mississippi last week to meet with our governor, meet with some of our first responders. You discussed some of the unique challenges that we are facing one of those challenges is an upcoming Hurricane Season that all the states along mississippi, or along the gulf coast as a whole are concerned about those challenges in the middle of the covid19 pandemic. Could you just take a few moments to kind of share with this committee some of the things that you shared with our governor about those upcoming challenges and what fema is doing to prepare for the challenges that lie ahead . Yes sir. It was actually a great visit in mississippi. We got to travel with the governor around the state, mostly across the gulf to visit fired parliaments, talk about grants and preparedness really fantastic day. I thank him for his hospitality. Along with the Emergency Management director, greg michelle. One of the things that we wanted to check on the season is obviously how it states adapted their existing plans for things like evacuation and sheltering, using the guidance that we have provided back in may and how they adapted. We wanted to go down there and take a Temperature Check to see how it is all going. This year is going to be a year like we have not had before because when it comes to simple things, like honoring an evacuation, it will take more time. If you need transportation, maybe it will take double the transportation. If you go to a shelter, maybe it will take double or triple the shelter space how have locals and states adapted to that . It is a challenge. I want to report that im completely impressed by all the effort that the mississippi Emergency Management has done in the dedication of the governor. Not to mention, its a priority. Its always, you have to do more and the clock is running against you. I encourage all my Emergency Managers across the country. Prepare now you do not know what the next thing is to hit you, so whether it is a hurricane or flooding or a fire, use this time now to prepare, to respond, while also responding to covid19. That is kind of the message, that guidance is available online. We put it out in may and made a big announcement. We encourage all states and locals, tribes and territories, to embrace our response to a traditional disaster and to covid19. That is one specific question as it relates to covid19. Based on your written testimony, theres two paragraphs there that are titled managing worldwide critical shortages we talked a little bit about global competition. You say there in your written testimony from the outset, a key element of femas response in managing shortfalls of medical supplies, you go on and give a list of those supplies and then you say we have been further challenged, as most of the manufacturing for ppe occurs in asia. I know that the wall street journal recently reported, prior to the covid19 outbreak, that china exported more respirators, surgical masks, medical gloves and protective garments than the rest of the world combined. My question to you is, how big of a challenge has it been to find that many of the items that we are in need of today are not manufactured in our country . That china has, if not the exclusive of, manufactures the large majority of medical supplies, critical drugs and things that we need. How big of a challenge has that been . Does Congress Need to focus our attention Going Forward in enticing those manufacturers to return the United States, so that those items are produced here . Yes sir. I said previously that, you know, we have to look at the shortages we have had a use ppp as an example as a National Security issue. Maybe today, as a pandemic, but maybe tomorrow with Something Different that requires n95 or another critical item that we, today rely on to provide to us. Maybe when the time comes, that we would be unwilling to do that. We need to take a critical look on a host of different items that are produced overseas and connect them to our National Security. I know there is lots of efforts going across government, d. O. D. And offense logistic agencies our great partners and help us bring manufacturing back to the u. S. Or entice u. S. Manufacturers to expand their product line or change their product line. The cares act provided a billion dollars for a lot of these initiatives that is only a start. We need to think long term because i think what we do historically is we will put a lot of money into it and it will last a couple of years, and maybe that business struggles to survive because the u. S. Made mask is two dollars and the chinese mask is 70 cents. You know how the American Public is and about, i want it cheap and fast, thats where it goes we need to support our Industrial Base in the u. S. , so we can do this for the long term. Take a holistic look about all of those items that are important to u. S. National security thank you sir mister chairman, i yield back. Thank you very much the chair yards back mr. Gaynor, before we close the hearing, as you know, i have said sent numerous letters to you around this topic and, before we adjourn, i need your commitment that all outstanding correspondence to you, relative to this pandemic and issues by this committee will be answered yes sir. You have my commitment and i think we talk previous about it. Unprecedented request of information from many different people, members of congress. We are working through all of them and some of the challenges, and im not trying to give an excuse, but some of the challenges, some of the information that you and other members are looking for reside and other agencies, so trying to get that information cleared and up to you takes a little bit of time. We are still responding. Again, we are trying to balance the response in all of the other things as well. I commit to today that we will answer all letters in full. Can you give people some time . I think theres a backlog of letters, so im trying to answer all those ones first and then as we work through that pile, we will get answering. We are answering letters every day. It may not seem like that, but we do get them out the door again, unprecedented request of information. 300 or more letters from members of congress. We want to make sure we get to those thoroughly. Again, the information in some of those requests come from other agencies, so its a back and forth. You know, just a couple of committees a jurisdiction that i think would have priority for your response and i would hope that youd give it some other responses are seven months old. So, that information you have, just send that and say, look im trying to get the rest, but to just not signed anything. We do that. We answer, some and they have been incomplete, but we try to get what we do out the door. We will continue to do that. Im glad you mentioned that. We just got a letter from monday and it had no documents that we requested. I think you need to either talk to your team and say we need to do better, because we are trying to do oversight. In that role, we cannot do it without the information. We are just trying to get the information. The other issue is for a lot of us, 140,000 americans have died. That is a god awful number. I think we are positioned for that number to go higher. A lot of members have come to the committee and said, it just appears that we can do more to mitigate so much of what is going on. Wearing a mask, the social distancing and we are practicing here today. A lot of things. But, it is the clear and coherent and consistent message that i think we need to get from everybody. From the white house, to the reserve that was working for fema in the field when you do not get that clear, consistent message, we have a problem. I thank you for your service, but that 140,000 deaths is nothing any of us can be proud of. We have to address it. I thank you for your testimony and the members for their questions. The members of the committee may have additional questions for you and the acts that you respond expedition sly in writing to those questions. Without objection, the committee record should be kept open for ten days. Hearing no further business, the committee stands adjourned. B today, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee holds a hearing on u. S. , china relations. Live today at 2 pm eastern. Listen live with the free cspan radio app. During the summer months, reach out here elected officials with cspans congressional directory. It contains all the Contact Information you need to stay in touch with members of congress, federal agencies and state governors. Order your copy online today at cspan store. Org. Coming, up we will bring you remarks from Florida Republican senator marco rubio on the u. S. Response to the coronavirus he will be speaking at a Virtual Event held by the Stanford University and the Hoover Institution this is today at 4 30 eastern on cspan three