But when Republicans objected to spending new money on the coronavirus response without first using unspent funding from existing aid programs, including money for state governments, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi pulled it from the $1.5 trillion annual spending bill.Ī bipartisan $10 billion deal in the Senate last month foundered over objections to the administration’s plans to relax pandemic restrictions at the southern border. Congressional negotiators cut the amount to $15.6 billion. That didn’t stop the administration from seeking another $22.5 billion in March to pay for COVID treatments, tests, vaccines and research. And only slightly more than a quarter of the $58 billion allotted to procure and distribute tests and setting up community-based testing programs had been spent. Of the $17 billion earmarked for drug and therapeutics research, development and procurement, less than 30% had been expended. Of the $41 billion allocated for vaccine research and development, procurement and distribution, less than a third had been spent. The Biden administration has claimed a COVID surge later this year could infect up to 30% of Americans if the government doesn’t secure $22.5 billion in new funding for vaccines and treatments STEFAN JEREMIAHĪmazingly, little of the HHS funding was directed to prevention or treatment and most remains unspent. By the end of November, HHS had only obligated 80% and spent 47% of its funds. Only 11% ( $484 billion) was routed to the Department of Health and Human Services, the agency most directly involved with responding to public-health emergencies. In January, the Government Accountability Office reported that only 87% of the total was obligated - legally committing the US government to pay - and only 76% was spent.Ĭontrary to what most Americans probably believe, little of the total was allocated for COVID vaccines, treatments and testing. ![]() The federal government has appropriated roughly $4.8 trillion in six COVID-relief laws, the most recent being President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan in March 2021. But the Biden administration wants to appropriate billions more and is resorting to scare tactics to get it. ![]() That great sloshing sound you hear is the tens of billions of dollars of unspent COVID-19 relief funds slopping around federal, state and local government coffers. GOPers rip NIH for giving research funds to firm run by scientist who tried to squelch Wuhan-lab theoryĪ brick wall for the Fed, Rand Paul’s lonely good fight and other commentary ![]() Tom DiNapoli quietly blasts fellow Dem Kathy Hochul’s pay-to-play corruption ACT test scores drop to their lowest in 30 years in dramatic pandemic slide
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