Political Quotes

“I come to the floor today to speak in support of Senate amendment No. 1729, which I hope will be added today to the National Defense Authorization Act. The goal of this amendment is to finish--what I hope is to finish a public health study that we began with legislation in 2017 to address the contaminant known as PFAS. I know the Presiding Officer knows about this because she has that chemical in her State as well. I want to begin by commending the work of the Armed Services Committee--both Chairman Inhofe and Ranking Member Reed for working with me to establish the first ever human health study of PFAS and to institute policies that will phase out the Defense Department's use of these chemicals over the next several years. We began this journey in 2017 when we put $10 million into a health study--the first of its kind in the country--to look at the impacts of PFAS on humans. At that time, we authorized $10 million for 3 years. Unfortunately, because of the coronavirus pandemic, it is taking longer to complete the study than we had hoped, so we are going to need some additional funding. There is real urgency in addressing PFAS. As many of us know, PFAS chemicals have emerged as widespread pollutants in the drinking water sources of military bases across this country. The main reason is because PFAS chemicals were used in firefighting foam that was used by the armed services.…”