Vaccination: Kelly worries too few will get shots.
Senator also supports minimum wage increase
U.S. Sen. Mark Kelly said Arizona’s coronavirus vaccine supplies should be moving toward meeting demand, but said he is worried that ultimately too few people will get the drug to help ward off widespread infections.
“Initially, we had a distribution problem. We had some doses. We couldn’t get them in people’s arms,” Kelly, DAriz., told reporters outside Luke Air Force Base, where he had just completed a tour of the facility for the first time as a senator.
“We’ve built the distribution system. Now we’ve got a supply problem. You know what’s probably coming next? We’re going to have a customer problem.”
During his conversation with the media, Kelly talked about the COVID-19
vaccine and ongoing efforts in Congress to pass a new coronavirus relief package and expressed support for increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.
The Luke tour happened on the same day that Kelly was announced as chairman of the Senate Armed Services subcommittee on Emerging Threats and Capabilities, a panel whose priorities include intelligence, special operations and counterterrorism.
Gov. Doug Ducey has “data that says about 50 to 55 percent of Arizonans are willing to get vaccinated. We need that number to be 75 percent,” Kelly said. “We’ve got to convince people to show up and get vaccinated and get their families vaccinated when it’s available to them. That’s the only way we’re going to really beat this thing.”
Kelly’s assessment comes at a time when many Arizonans who do want a vaccine still can’t get vaccinated. Like the nation as a whole, Arizona’s infection numbers are receding, though health officials remain concerned about rolling out the vaccines, the distribution of vaccines to lower-income residents and minorities, and the spread of variants of the new coronavirus that causes the often deadly disease.
On the economic front, Kelly said he supported a virus relief bill that could approach $2 trillion, saying the nation’s needs are serious and urgent.
“We need to keep the money out there. Unemployment benefits are going to expire here at the end of March. You know, the details of any of this matter. I think it’s important that we target this where it’s needed the most, but the economic crisis that we’re still facing is significant, and we’re not seeing (economic) growth numbers that we would like, and the unemployment rate is still high. We’re going to get people back to work. Getting kids back in school, that’s going to take resources.
“We’ll figure out what the top line number of this happens to be in negotiation between the House and the Senate.”
Kelly also said he supported the need for a federal $15 hourly minimum wage, saying he was flexible on how to implement it but said it was impossible to support a family without doing so.
“I’ve spoken to folks that try to survive ... on minimum wage, try to raise a family. It’s nearly, it’s impossible,” he said. “I
“Initially, we had a distribution problem. We had some doses. We couldn’t get them in people’s arms. We’ve built the distribution system. Now we’ve got a supply problem. You know what’s probably coming next? We’re going to have a customer problem.”
Sen. Mark Kelly D-Ariz.
mean, you can’t work 40 hours a week on minimum wage and raise a family and have a decent standard of living.
“The proposal is $15, that makes sense. The details of how we do this, when we do this. That all matters.”
On that issue, Kelly disagrees with U.S. Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., who has said she doesn’t see raising the federal minimum wage as part of President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion virus relief package winding its way through Congress.
The National Republican Senatorial Committee has criticized Kelly for spending the week on recess without passing the virus relief plan he and other Democrats have said is so needed.
During his tour of Luke, Kelly inspected an F-35 fighter jet and used a simulator to handle one.
The trip was Kelly’s first to Luke since he took office in December.
The former Navy fighter pilot and NASA astronaut and Senate Armed Services Committee member received a briefing on how the 7,000 employees of the base have adapted their operations during the pandemic and how several technological innovations are being used there.
The visit was intended to help Kelly understand Luke’s operations better as well as its most critical hardware: the F-35.
Kelly jokingly said the jet is “rather impressive.”
It has had a bumpy history with the Pentagon because of steep cost overruns a decade ago and performance concerns that have declined with refinements.
Former President Donald Trump negotiated the price per jet under $100 million in a deal that secured more aircraft for Lockheed Martin, its manufacturer.
Throughout the briefing that was open to reporters, Kelly sought comparisons between the F-16 jets and the F-35s that are gradually replacing them.
Officials said the 80-year-old Luke facility has posed challenges to operations, but said engineers have been able to work around the issue to this point.
The brass at Luke told him about pilot tracking systems intended to monitor details like heart rate variability and where pilots’ eyes are as they fly equipment that has gotten similar scrutiny for years.