“You think they just pulled 89 out of a hat?” he snapped. “No. This isn’t a coincidence. We’re not idiots. This is spitting at our soldiers who have done the right thing.”
The news also prompted legislative action. On Wednesday, Sen. Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) and 16 Democratic colleagues introduced “The National Guard COVID-19 Response Stability Act,” a bill to extend the federal deployment status and funding for duration of the national public health emergency, ensuring Guard members can claim their benefits.
Duckworth told POLITICO that the legislation would provide stability and security to both Guard members and states alike. She said the current situation “prevents the National Guard from focusing on responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, creates uncertainty among members of the Guard over receipt of full federal benefits and wastes resources during a public health emergency by requiring states to repeatedly go through a challenging and time consuming process of preparing extension requests and submitting them to the federal Government, with no guarantee that extensions will be granted in a timely manner, or at all.”
Another bill set to be introduced Friday by Rep. Jimmy Panetta (D-Calif.) would direct the Defense and Veterans Affairs secretaries to give Guard members credit for at least 90 days regardless of when the deployment ends.
If President Trump does not approve an extension, states would begin to lose Guard members’ services on June 10, because Guard members would have to self-quarantine for 14 days before returning to civilian life on June 24. As of Monday, at least 1,158 members had been diagnosed with Covid-19, including 617 active cases.
States that tried to keep the troops in action by shifting them to their own payrolls would face extra burdens at a time of extraordinary pressure on state budgets which, unlike the federal budget, cannot go into deficit spending.
The National Council of State Legislatures estimates the cost of the deployment to be as much as $9 million per month for every 1,000 troops. Bustos, who also leads Democrats’ congressional campaign arm, said that is a price tag no state can currently afford.
“We have state governments all over this country losing billions in tax revenue because of this pandemic, and you have Mitch McConnell saying he’s in no rush to help them,” she said. “So to ask states to cover this cost — that’s not something they’re going to be able to do.”
Gidley, the White House spokesperson, disputed that and said in his statement: “President Trump loves and supports the hardworking brave men and women of the National Guard, and this Administration has made sure 49 states and territories have been given 100 percent of the resources needed to take care of these incredible Guardsmen during this unprecedented pandemic.”
Source: politico.com
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