On Thursday, asked about a fellow House Democrat who held up a small protest sign during Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu’s speech to Congress the day before, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said: “Rashida Tlaib is an elected member of Congress. She has a responsibility to her district in the same way that I have a responsibility to my district.”
So why, the following day, Friday, was Brooklyn Congressman Hakeem Jeffries, who correctly “has a responsibility to my district,” missing from being a cosponsor of the 9/11 Responder and Survivor Health Funding Correction Act of 2024?
The bill is needed to pump $2.9 billion into the World Trade Center Health Program, which provides medical care for the responders and survivors of 9/11, the heroes and victims of that infamous attack on this country and this city who have been sickened by the toxic plume that enveloped Downtown when Osama Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda terrorists toppled the WTC.
Jeffries wasn’t the only New Yorker absent from the crucial bill, Adriano Espaillat is also missing. We trust shortly after this editorial is published that the oversight will be quickly corrected and they will join every other New Yorker in Congress, from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on the left to Elise Stefanik on the right. But on this matter, party and ideology is irrelevant.
What is relevant is that the health program, run by the CDC, is getting low on funds. This as the number of people needing care for cancer and other ailments is growing and their treatment is getting more expensive. Without additional resources, the health care for hero firefighters and cops and everyone else caught in the poisonous cloud will have to be rationed. That must not happen. Congress has the obligation to keep the program solvent.
We understand that as Democratic Caucus leader, Jeffries does not generally sponsor legislation. But this is an exception. Last year, he and a few other New Yorkers were not on the bill, which they all rectified when we pointed it out. Remember what Jeffries said, “I have a responsibility to my district.” The WTC Health Program actually covers Americans in every congressional district but one (a very rural part of Northern California).
We also understand that Jeffries has been busy with the presidential campaigns of Joe Biden and now Kamala Harris. But so has another busy Brooklyn guy, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. Schumer also is the top man in his caucus and he also was deeply involved with the Biden/Harris situation. But Schumer stood with his colleague Kirsten Gillibrand and many House members to push the bill and try to get it passed before the November elections.
9/11 was a long time ago. Going back 23 years, Hakeem Jeffries was a fairly new attorney licensed to practice in New York (and where he is still currently registered) in the middle of his six-year stint at a big law firm. He wouldn’t enter public office, in the state Assembly, until 2007 and Congress until 2013.
House Speaker Mike Johnson also wasn’t in public office, on 9/11. His dad, Pat, was a hero firefighter who was grievously injured battling a Louisiana blaze. Jeffries and Johnson must work together to get this bill passed this year.
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