16 Attorneys General urge Congress to revoke, limit federal emergency powers

by Bethany Blankley (Center Square)

Sixteen attorneys general are urging members of Congress to revise, clarify and revoke the emergency-use authorization authority used by federal agencies to mandate coronavirus-related policies.

The letter, sent at the end of January to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rogers, both Republicans, deals with reducing the authority of the US Health and Human Services and Food and Drug Administration departments.

The AGs requested that Congress make existing emergency-use authorization policies still in effect and that federal authorities conduct rigorous oversight to establish what went wrong with current and past implementation. They asked Congress to “consider revising the accountability protections provided by previous Congresses and to ensure that the President” [Joe] Biden admitted, and what the American people know in their right judgment: that any legitimate basis for claiming a medical emergency due to COVID has been exhausted; Normalcy and rule of law must be restored.”

Led by Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, the coalition represents the states of Alaska, Arkansas, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas and Utah.

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Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has sued the administration over its COVID-related orders, said the Biden administration “tried to use the pandemic as an excuse to establish a number of unrelated left-wing policy objectives. HHS and the FDA have abused emergency powers to force vaccine injections. , which can have serious, adverse side effects on young children and healthy adults, despite being least likely to be affected by Covid-19.”

The attorney general argues that HHS and the FDA continue to abuse the authority granted to them during emergencies, particularly by relying on emergency powers to “justify the numerous uses of novel vaccines that are not only failing to prevent transmission of COVID but also exposing young people to it.” people (who are less likely to be harmed by COVID) to unnecessary risks,” the letter states. “Shockingly,” they write, “the FDA is still calling for its emergency use approval authority to press [COVID-19] Vaccines are out for children.”

The companies are doing so after Biden said last September that the “pandemic is over.” He told 60 Minutes, “The pandemic is over. We still have problems with covid. We are still working on it a lot. But the epidemic is over. If you notice, no one is wearing a mask. Everyone seems to be in pretty good shape, and so I think it’s changing…”

He made the comments after months of his administration seeking to add about $22 billion more to the omnibus spending bill to fund Covid-related programs, NPR reported at the time.

Despite these claims, the president and his administration are using emergency use authorizations to justify an “unprecedented expansion of executive power.”

“From student loan forgiveness to moratoriums on evictions, the president and his administration continue to attempt to advance an authoritarian agenda based on an emergency that, according to the president, does not exist,” the AG wrote. “The idea that we are still in a medical emergency flies in the face of the truth on the ground. Yet, HHS and FDA perpetuate the myth that an emergency exists to expand their powers at the expense of people’s liberties.”

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They also called on Congress to “abuse various statutory emergency authority provisions in their “unrealistic and unrealistic quest to operate under emergency authority indefinitely” and “to narrow and modify the unilateral authority that agencies and the President have during emergencies.”

They called for “quick action” to override any remaining emergency use authorizations for the Covid vaccine, to consider reforms to the sweeping liability shield created in 2005, and to “move quickly” to ensure our liberties and systems of government stand firm against any such future attempts at treatment. is protected. Torture.”

Syndicated with permission from Center Square.