Letter to Hon. Joseph Biden, President of the United States - Sen. Cramer, Colleagues Press White House for Accounting of Trillions in COVID-19 Spending

Letter

U.S Senator Kevin Cramer (R-ND), member of the Senate Budget Committee, joined Senator Mitt Romney (R-UT) and 32 of his Republican colleagues in a letter to President Biden requesting an accounting of how the federal government has allocated trillions in taxpayer funds to combat the pandemic. Specific answers to these questions are vital before Congress considers additional COVID-19 funding requests from the White House.

"Recent news reports indicate the Administration is poised to request an additional $30 billion from Congress for its response to COVID-19," the senators wrote. "While we have supported historic, bipartisan measures in the United States Senate to provide unprecedented investments in vaccines, therapeutics, and testing, it is not yet clear why additional funding is needed."

"Since passage of the American Rescue Plan in February, questions are mounting about where exactly the additional money has gone." the senators continued. "A recent investigative report from the Washington Post headlined, "Immense fraud creates immense task for Washington as it tries to tighten scrutiny of $6 trillion in emergency coronavirus spending' details the federal government's shocking failure to provide the American public with a faithful accounting of how it has spent its money."

"Before we would consider supporting an additional $30 billion for COVID-19 relief, Congress must receive a full accounting of how the government has already spent the first $6 trillion," the senators concluded.

Senators Cramer and Romney were joined on the letter by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Senators John Barrasso (R-WY), John Boozman (R-AR), Mike Braun (R-IN), Richard Burr (R-NC), Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV), Bill Cassidy (R-LA), John Cornyn (R-TX), Mike Crapo (R-ID), Ted Cruz (R-TX), Steve Daines (R-MT), Joni Ernst (R-IA), Deb Fischer (R-NE), Chuck Grassley (R-IA), Bill Hagerty (R-TN), Josh Hawley (R-MS), John Hoeven (R-ND), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-MS), Ron Johnson (R-WI), Cynthia Lummis (R-WY), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Rob Portman (R-OH), Jim Risch (R-ID), Mike Rounds (R-SD), Tim Scott (R-SC), Dan Sullivan (R-AK), John Thune (R-SD), Thom Tillis (R-NC), Pat Toomey (R-PA), Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), Roger Wicker (R-MS), and Todd Young (R-IN).