White House seeks $29B in disaster aid
WASHINGTON— The Trump administration on Wednesday asked Congress for $29 billion in disaster aid to cover ongoing hurricane relief and recovery efforts and to pay federal flood insurance claims.
The request comes as the government is spending almost $200 million a day for emergency hurricane response and faces a surge in flood claims for federally insured homes and businesses slammed by hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria.
Wednesday’ s request proposal would provide $16 billion to pay those flood claims, alongwith $13 billion for Federal Emergency Management Agency disaster relief efforts. Federal firefighting accounts would receive $577 million as well to replenish them after a disastrous season of western wildfires.
Children’s health program
WASHINGTON — Legislation to rescue the Children’s Health Insurance Program sailed through a Senate committee on Wednesday, but touched off a partisan conflict in the House, diminishing hopes that the popular program would be quickly refinanced.
Funding for the program expired on Sunday, and state officials said they would soon start notifying families that children could lose coverage if Congress did not provide additional money. It was impossible to say when Congress might pass a bill and send it to President Donald Trump.
By voice vote, the Senate Finance Committee approved a bill on Wednesday that would provide more than $100 billion over five years for the program, which insures nearly 9 million children.
The committee chairman, Sen. Orrin G. Hatch, R-Utah, hailed the bill as “a prime example of what government can accomplish when both parties work together.”
But in the House Energy and Commerce Committee, lawmakers brawled Wednesday over a similar bill to provide money for the children’s health program. Democrats strongly support the program, but complained that Republicans would take money from Medicare and the Affordable Care Act to offset the cost.
JFK assassination files
WASHINGTON— Senior lawmakers are calling on President Donald Trump to allow the release of remaining government records on the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.
Resolutions introduced in the House and Senate would call on the president to allow release of documents held by the National Archives and Records Administration, and for the Archives to work to meet a statutory deadline that arrives later in October.
The deadline occurs because it will be the 25th anniversary of the signing of the President John F. Kennedy Assassination Records Collection Act.
Also in the nation ...
Members of Congress expressed bewilderment Wednesday that credit reporting company Equifax received a $7.25 million contract with the IRS to validate the identity of taxpayers communicating with the agency on the phone or online. ... Congressional Republicans on Wednesday kicked off debate on House and Senate budget plans that promise slashing cuts to social programs and aim for a sweeping overhaul of the U.S. tax code that would add up to $1.5 trillion to the nation’s spiraling debt. ... Inmates at a state prison in Alaska were stripped naked in front of female prison staff members, walked naked on a “dog leash” and left without clothing or cover in cold, filthy cells for hours at a time, according to a report released by a state watchdog.