The Zika virus is at the center of debate among lawmakers.
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“It is disappointing to watch Iowa’s GOP Senators vote for a bill that would only partially fund the fight against the Zika virus and would punish women in Zika affected areas by limiting their access to health services”, she said.
Negotiations around a continuing resolution expected to include Zika funding are ongoing, but Senate leaders hope to bring the measure to the floor sometime next week.
The 52-46 tally felt short of the supermajority needed to overcome a filibuster and came as lawmakers returned to Washington for the first votes in seven weeks.
Governor Scott was supposed to be in Washington D.C. this week to talk to members of Congress about Zika funding. The Hill reported that Democrats almost unanimously voted to block the bill because of language targeting funding for Planned Parenthood.
Six months after President Raul Castro declared war on the Zika virus in Cuba, a militarized nationwide campaign of intensive mosquito spraying, monitoring and quarantine appears to be working.
The United States had confirmed 16,610 cases of the Zika virus as of August 31st. An additional 2,686 were reported as travel-related transmissions.
In addition, CDC officials are reporting 624 pregnant women have tested positive for the Zika virus, and 16 babies have been born in the US with birth defects linked to the illness. “The urgency is here, we must act upon it, and Congress must act”.
This time pressure has many, including Sen.
The Miami Herald on Tuesday quoted Senators Marco Rubio of Florida and Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri, who chairs a Senate panel overseeing healthcare funding, suggesting the Planned Parenthood language might have to be dropped in order to reach a deal. “I think trying to find some path forward in a year-end appropriations bill would make sense”. The issues the Democrats simply couldn’t yield on pertained to the bill’s stripping of more than half a billion dollars sitting unspent in an Obamacare fund, as well as roughly $200 million from other unused federal funds. “I am disappointed a bill which included funding for the Zika virus died today in the Senate”.
A Pelosi aide said the $1.1 billion in the Senate measure meets that criteria.
“But both sides will declare some level of victory and there’s probably other places where that money would be better spent right now anyway, based on where we are at this moment with vaccines as well as tests”, Blunt said.
Republicans have accused Democrats of blocking the bill to gain political advantage by portraying Republicans as obstructionists on Zika funding.
“Senate Democrats played politics”, she said on WMT AM 600.
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“We passed something here with 89 votes”. Republicans countered that the objection was a flimsy excuse compared to the Zika threat.
