Tag Archives: Biden-Harris Administration

Biden Administration, Health Care, News & Photo Features, Obamacare

Biden-Harris Administration Proposes Rule to Expand Coverage of Affordable Contraception Under the Affordable Care Act

Women’s March outside Trump International, NYC, 2019. Under President Biden and Vice President Harris’s leadership, the Administration is taking bold action to expand coverage of contraception for the 52 million women of reproductive age with private health insurance, marking the most significant expansion of contraception benefits under the Affordable Care Act in more than a decade. This action builds on the Biden-Harris Administration’s strong record of defending access to reproductive health care and commitment to ensuring that women have the freedom to make deeply personal health care decisions, including if and when to start or grow their family. In contrast, Trump and  Republican elected officials continue to threaten women’s health, lives, and freedom through extreme abortion bans, some with no exceptions for rape or incest, are moving to ban contraception and Morning After medication. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

Today, October 21, 2024, the Biden-Harris Administration proposed a rule to expand coverage of affordable contraception under the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare). Here is a memo from Jennifer Klein, Director of the White House Gender Policy Council which Biden established, and a fact sheet from the White House on the proposal:


Interested Parties Memo: Biden-⁠Harris Administration Expands Coverage of Contraception Under the Affordable Care Act as Republican Elected Officials Continue Attacks on Reproductive Freedom
From: Jennifer Klein, Director, White House Gender Policy Council
 

Under President Biden and Vice President Harris’s leadership, the Administration is taking bold action to expand coverage of contraception for the 52 million women of reproductive age with private health insurance, marking the most significant expansion of contraception benefits under the Affordable Care Act in more than a decade.

Today’s announcement builds on the Biden-Harris Administration’s strong record of defending access to reproductive health care and commitment to ensuring that women have the freedom to make deeply personal health care decisions, including if and when to start or grow their family.

Meanwhile, Republican elected officials continue to threaten women’s health, lives, and freedom through extreme abortion bans, some with no exceptions for rape or incest. Women are being denied essential medical care while doctors and nurses are threatened with jail time. Abortion, contraception, and IVF are under attack, while Republicans in Congress refuse to protect nationwide access to this vital reproductive health care. This extreme agenda is out-of-touch with the American people—which is why voters have overwhelmingly chosen to protect reproductive freedom in every state where abortion has been on the ballot.

President Biden and Vice President Harris stand with the vast majority of Americans in supporting a woman’s right to choose, and they will continue the fight against a national abortion ban and call on Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade in federal law once and for all.

Read the Rest of the Interested Parties Memo Here
Read President Biden’s Statement Here
Read Vice President Harris’ Statement Here
Read the Fact Sheet Here (and below)

FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Proposes Rule to Expand Coverage of Affordable Contraception Under the Affordable Care Act

Biden-Harris Administration Announces Proposal for Most Significant Expansion of Contraception Coverage Under the Affordable Care Act in More Than a Decade

President Biden and Vice President Harris have protected and built on the Affordable Care Act. Nearly 50 million people over the past decade have had coverage through the Affordable Care Act’s Marketplaces, and the law has protected more than 100 million people with preexisting medical conditions. Thanks to the Biden-Harris Administration, Affordable Care Act coverage is more affordable than ever with millions of families saving an average of $800 per year on Marketplace coverage.
 
The Affordable Care Act has also helped millions of women save billions of dollars on contraception—an essential component of reproductive health care that has only become more important since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. As part of President Biden and Vice President Harris’ steadfast commitment to reproductive rights, the Biden-Harris Administration has further strengthened contraception access and affordability under the Affordable Care Act, through Medicare and Medicaid, through the Title X Family Planning Program, through federally qualified health centers, and for federal employees, Service members, veterans, and college students.
 
Today, the Biden-Harris Administration is proposing a rule that would significantly increase coverage of contraception without cost sharing for 52 million women of reproductive age with private health insurance. Building on the Affordable Care Act’s requirement that most private health plans must cover contraception without cost sharing, today’s proposed rule from the Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS), Labor, and the Treasury would:

  • Expand coverage of over-the-counter contraception without cost sharing. Under the proposed rule, for the first time, women would be able to obtain over-the-counter (OTC) contraception without a prescription at no additional cost. As a result, more women would be able to access and afford critical OTC medications such as emergency contraception and the first-ever daily oral contraceptive approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for use without a prescription that is now widely available across the country.
     
  • Make it easier to learn about coverage for OTC contraception. To help ensure that women understand this new benefit, most private health plans would be required to disclose that OTC contraception is covered without cost sharing and without a prescription—and take steps to help women learn more about their contraception coverage.
     
  • Strengthen coverage of prescribed contraception without cost sharing. The proposed rule would make it easier for most women with private health insurance to obtain contraception without cost sharing that is prescribed by their health care provider. Health plans would be required to cover every FDA-approved contraceptive drug or drug-led combination product without cost sharing unless the plan also covers a therapeutic equivalent without cost sharing, eliminating barriers that some women continue to face in accessing contraception prescribed by their provider.

This proposed rule, if finalized, would be the most significant expansion of contraception coverage under the Affordable Care Act since 2012, when contraception was first required to be covered. Also today, the Biden-Harris Administration is issuing new guidance to help ensure that patients can access other preventive services, such as cancer screenings, that must be covered without cost sharing under the Affordable Care Act.
 
The Biden-Harris Administration is issuing this proposed rule at a time when reproductive rights are under attack, and Republican elected officials remain committed to repealing the Affordable Care Act. Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, dangerous and extreme abortion bans are putting women’s health and lives at risk and disrupting access to critical health care services, including contraception, as health care providers are forced to close in states across the country. At the same time, Republican elected officials in some states have made clear they want to ban or restrict birth control in addition to abortion, and Republicans in Congress have attacked contraception access nationwide by proposing to defund the Title X Family Planning Program. In contrast, President Biden and Vice President Harris believe that women in every state must have the freedom to make deeply personal health care decisions, including the right to decide if and when to start or grow their family.
 
Today’s announcements build on actions that the Biden-Harris Administration has already taken to expand access to affordable contraception, including to implement the President’s Executive Order on Strengthening Access to Affordable, High-Quality Contraception and Family Planning Services from June 2023. The Administration has taken action to:

  • Expand contraception coverage and affordability under the Affordable Care Act. The Departments of HHS, Labor, and the Treasury proposed a rule to provide a new pathway under the Affordable Care Act for women to access coverage of contraceptives when their private health coverage is exempt from covering this benefit due to a religious objection. These agencies also issued new guidance to support expanded coverage of a broader range of FDA-approved, cleared, or granted contraceptives at no additional cost under the Affordable Care Act, building on guidance issued after Roe v. Wade was overturned to clarify protections for contraceptive coverage under the Affordable Care Act. Further, HHS strengthened the standard for inclusion of family planning providers in Marketplace plan provider networks and provided nearly $9 million in grant funding to support state efforts to enhance and expand coverage of, and access to, reproductive and maternal health services, including contraception. And the Internal Revenue Service issued new guidance affirming that high-deductible health plans can cover OTC contraception as preventive care.
     
  • Bolster family planning services through Title X clinics. HHS continues to rebuild and grow the Title X Family Planning Program, which has played a critical role in ensuring access to a broad range of high-quality family planning and preventive health services for more than 50 years. During the prior administration, more than 1,000 service sites left the Title X Family Planning Program, leading to a significant decline in people served. The Biden-Harris Administration reversed the policy changes that led to those departures, strengthening the Title X Family Planning Program and helping ensure that the Program remains a critical part of the nation’s health safety net. In 2023, HHS provided about $287 million to nearly 4,000 Title X clinics across the country to provide free or low-cost voluntary, client-centered family planning and related preventive services for 2.8 million women and families—an 80 percent increase since 2020.
     
  • Support family planning coverage through the Medicaid and Medicare programs. The Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) issued new guidance to state Medicaid programs and Children’s Health Insurance Programs (CHIP) to help ensure that enrollees can access family planning services. The new guidance outlined existing state obligations under federal law, highlighted strategies to enhance access to contraception, affirmed confidentiality requirements for those seeking family planning services, and shared recommendations on ways to measure quality in delivering family planning services. To help ensure that women with Medicare coverage have access to more covered types of contraception without unnecessary barriers, CMS updated its Medicare Part D formulary clinical review process for plan year 2024 and 2025 to include additional contraceptive types, such as long-acting contraceptives, and is increasing public awareness of contraceptive coverage options under Medicare Part B. The Secretary of HHS also issued a letter to state Medicaid and CHIP programs as well as private health insurers and Medicare plans about their existing obligations to cover contraception for those they serve.
     
  • Increase contraception access through federal health centers. Federal health centers continue to be an important source of family planning services: in 2023, health centers provided nearly 3 million contraceptive services visits to patients, a 14 percent increase since 2020. To support health centers in providing high-quality family planning services, the Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) provided updated guidance on existing federal requirements for family planning and related services, which is a required primary health care service under federal law, as well as evidence-based recommendations and resources. HRSA also adopted new data measures for health centers that will help assess whether patients have been screened for contraception needs. Screening and data measures will help enhance the overall delivery of voluntary family planning and related services.
     
  • Support contraception access for federal employees and their families. The Office of Personnel Management strengthened access to contraception for federal workers, retirees, and family members by issuing guidance to insurers participating in the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program to clarify standards and support expanded coverage of a broader range of FDA-approved, cleared, or granted contraceptives at no additional cost. The Office of Personnel Management also required insurers that participate in the Federal Employee Health Benefits Program to take additional steps to educate enrollees about their contraception benefits and launched a public education campaign to highlight contraception benefits available to federal employees and their families.
     
  • Promote contraception access and affordability for Service members and their families and certain dependents of veterans. To improve access to contraception at military hospitals and clinics, the Department of Defense expanded walk-in contraceptive care services for active-duty Service members and other Military Health System beneficiaries and eliminated TRICARE copays for certain contraceptive services. And the Department of Veterans Affairs eliminated out-of-pocket costs for certain types of contraception through the Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Department of Veterans Affairs.
     
  • Support access to affordable contraception for college students. To help increase access to contraception for college students, President Biden directed the Secretary of Education to convene institutions of higher education to share best practices and ways to help students understand their options for accessing contraception. In 2023, Vice President Harris joined a Department of Education convening of representatives from 68 colleges and universities across 32 states to discuss promising strategies for protecting and expanding access to contraception for their students. This convening followed Vice President Harris’s multiple conversations about reproductive health access with students on college campuses across the country.
     
  • Enhance contraception access through technical assistance and public-private partnership. In June 2023, HHS announced a new five-year public-private partnership to expand access to contraception with Upstream, a national nonprofit organization that provides health centers with free patient-centered, evidence-based training and technical assistance to eliminate provider-level barriers to offering the full range of contraceptive options. To date, HHS has connected Upstream to more than 130 health care clinics, resulting in partnerships that will help Upstream accelerate their national expansion to reach 5 million women of reproductive age every year.
     
  • Promote research and data analysis on contraception access. To document the gaps and disparities in contraception access as well as the benefits of comprehensive coverage, HHS convened leading experts to discuss the state of research, data collection, and data analysis on contraception access and family planning services. These convenings helped identify research gaps, opportunities for collaboration, and ways to bolster research efforts for both Federal agencies and external partners.

In addition to strengthening access to affordable contraception, the Biden-Harris Administration continues to implement President Biden’s threeExecutiveOrders and a Presidential Memorandum directing federal agencies to protect access to reproductive health care issued since the Court overturned Roe v. Wade. To date, the Biden-Harris Administration has taken action to protect access to abortion, including FDA-approved medication abortion; defend access to emergency medical care; support the ability to travel for reproductive health care; safeguard the privacy of patients and health care providers; and ensure access to accurate information and legal resources.

The Vice President has led the White House’s efforts to partner with leaders on the frontlines of protecting access to abortion, highlighting the harm of abortion bans to women’s health at more than 100 events in more than 20 states since Roe v. Wade was overturned, and meeting with hundreds of  state legislators, health care providers, and advocates. On what would have been the 51st anniversary of Roe v. Wade, the Vice President launched a nationwide Fight for Reproductive Freedoms tour to continue fighting back against extreme attacks throughout America.

President Biden and Vice President Harris will continue to call on Congress to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade in federal law to ensure that women in every state are able to make their own decisions about reproductive health care.

See also:
To Protect Women’s Freedom, Liberty, Life, Vote for Harris, Democrats and the ERA

Biden Administration, News & Photo Features

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in Florida, Georgia, Oct. 2

This update on Biden-Harris Administration’s Hurricane Helene Response is provided by the White House:

President Biden and Vice President Harris continue to mobilize an intensive Federal response to the impacts of Hurricane Helene. The Administration is prioritizing life-saving and life-sustaining response efforts in impacted communities, as well as ensuring people displaced from the storm have prompt access to Federal resources that will enable them to both purchase essential items and begin their road to recovery and rebuilding.
 
President Biden has “received praise from Republican governors” as a result of his leadership throughout the response – including speaking to several Republican leaders across the country.

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in Florida

Latest updates as of October 2:

  • The White House has reached out to more than 200 officials across Florida over the last few days to offer support and gauge additional assistance needs.
  • President Biden made additional disaster assistance available to the State of Florida by authorizing an increase in the level of Federal funding for emergency work. Under the President’s order today, Federal funds for debris removal and emergency protective measures, including direct Federal assistance, has been increased to 100 percent of the total eligible costs for 90 days from the start of the incident period.
  • President Biden approved a major disaster declaration for the state of Florida, allowing survivors to immediately access funds and resources to jumpstart their recovery. People in 17 counties in Florida can now apply for assistance with FEMA. People can apply in three ways: online by visiting disasterassistance.gov, calling 1-800-621-3362 or on the FEMA App.
    • FEMA assistance in Florida may include upfront funds to help with essential items like food, water, baby formula and other emergency supplies. Funds may also be available to repair storm-related damage to homes and personal property, as well as assistance to find a temporary place to stay.
  • Five counties were added for individual assistance in response to Hurricane Helene. Florida homeowners and renters in 22 counties who had uninsured damage or losses caused by Hurricane Helene may be eligible for FEMA disaster assistance.
    • FEMA may be able to help with serious needs, displacement, temporary lodging, basic home repair costs, personal property loss or other disaster-caused needs. Homeowners and renters in Charlotte, Citrus, Columbia, Dixie, Franklin, Gilchrist, Hamilton, Hernando, Hillsborough, Jefferson, Lafayette, Lee, Leon, Levy, Madison, Manatee, Pasco, Pinellas, Sarasota, Suwannee, Taylor and Wakulla counties can apply.
  • FEMA has already approved more than $3 million to help survivors recover.
  • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance crews are in Florida neighborhoods helping people apply for FEMA assistance after Hurricane Helene.
  • Disaster Recovery Centers are operating in Pinellas, Taylor, Manatee, Sarasota and Hillsborough counties to provide one-on-one help to Floridians affected by Hurricane Helene.
  • The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is conducting debris assessments in four counties and water/wastewater assessments in three counties.
  • The Salvation Army has 29 active mobile feeding units serving meals & distributing supplies in nine counties.
  • The American Red Cross is conducting direct emergency feeding and working with feeding partners to provide distribution in support of partner production
  • Team Rubicon Greyshirts will arrive soon to begin several weeks of muckouts/removal of mud and debris from homes.
  • FEMA awarded an expedited grant of nearly $18.7 million to the State of Florida for emergency protective measures for Hurricane Helene, including search and rescue, search and recovery, patient movement, critical infrastructure and hazardous materials response, emergency operations support and mass care coordination.
  • FEMA Voluntary Agency Liaisons are working are working with the state to help coordinate voluntary support efforts.
  • EPA is providing a mobile testing lab to assist the state with water sample testing.

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in Georgia

Latest updates as of October 2:

  • Vice President Harris visited Georgia today to receive operational briefings, meet with residents impacted by the storm, and provide updates to local officials on actions that are being taken to support emergency response and recovery efforts in Georgia.
  • The President has approved Governor Kemp’s request for a 100 percent Federal cost share for debris removal and emergency protective measures for three months. This will support the urgent work to address the impacts from debris removal and flooding, and will cover costs of first responders, search and rescue, shelters, mass feeding, and other emergency response activities in this critical time.
  • President Biden approved a Major Disaster declaration for Georgia, allowing individuals in 41 counties to apply for FEMA assistance. People in these Georgia counties can now apply for assistance with FEMA.
    • People can apply in three ways: online by visiting disasterassistance.gov, calling 1-800-621-3362 or on the FEMA App.
  • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are in the field, focusing on shelters where they will assist survivors in applying for assistance.
  • FEMA has already approved more than $663,000 in individual assistance to survivors.
  • Power restoration crews continue working 24 hours a day throughout parts of Georgia. Generators, mutual aid crews and additional power restoration assets are being moved into the hardest hit areas as debris removal allows.
  • The U.S. Department of Energy has responders deployed to Georgia to assist restoration efforts.
  • A FEMA Incident Management Assistance Team is onsite at the state Emergency Operations Center to coordinate with the state and facilitate any requests for assistance.
  • In Georgia, 520 survivors are staying in eight shelters.
  • The American Red Cross is conducting direct emergency feeding and working with feeding partners to provide distribution in support of partner production.
  • The Salvation Army has 26 active mobile feeding in 10 Georgia counties.
  • Team Rubicon is conducting route clearing operations in Ray City.
  • Residents can find resources like shelters and feeding sites at gema.georgia.gov/hurricane-helene. 
  • In Georgia 75% of power outages have been restored.
  • Five FEMA Division Supervisors are establishing contact with Georgia Emergency Management Agency Regional Coordinators.
  • FEMA is supporting commodity requests across the state, including water, ice, shelf-stable meals, fuel (gasoline, diesel, propane) and tarps.
  • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are conducting Assess, Inform Report missions. These mission focus on disaster impacts to the community and reflect emerging or critical issues impacting the community such as infrastructure and public services. These data points are issues that could affect most if not all survivors in the community.
  • Ten American Red Cross shelters are open with a population of 513. Shelters are in Brooks, Clinch, Coffee, Cook, Lanier, Lowndes, McDuffie, Pierce, Richmond, and Treutlan counties
  • Two animal shelters are open including one American Red Cross shelter in Cook County.
Biden Administration, Climate Change, News & Photo Features

FACT SHEET: UPDATE: Biden-Harris Continues Life-Saving Response Efforts in Response to Hurricane Helene

Today, President Biden is announcing 1,000 active-duty troops will be immediately deployed to assist with response and recovery efforts

As part of a coordinated response to the devastation of Hurricane Helene, President Biden  announced he has directed the Department of Defense to deploy up to 1,000 active-duty soldiers to support the delivery of food, water, and other critical commodities to communities impacted by Hurricane Helene © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com via MSNBC

This fact sheet of the Biden-Harris administration’s continued life-saving response to the devastation of Hurricane Helene is provided by the White House:

President Biden and Vice President Harris continue to mobilize an intensive Federal response to the impacts of Hurricane Helene. The Administration is prioritizing life-saving and life-sustaining response efforts in impacted communities, as well as ensuring people displaced from the storm have prompt access to Federal resources that will enable them to both purchase essential items and begin their road to recovery and rebuilding.
 
As part of this coordinated response, today, President Biden is announcing he has directed the Department of Defense to deploy up to 1,000 active-duty soldiers to support the delivery of food, water, and other critical commodities to communities impacted by Hurricane Helene. The announcement is effective immediately, and these forces will be available for deployment starting today. This action will provide additional manpower and logistics capabilities, enabling FEMA and other interagency partners to reach the hardest hit areas as quickly as possible.
 
This comes as the President is traveling today to North Carolina and South Carolina. In Western North Carolina, he will survey areas impacted by Hurricane Helene by air, receive operational briefings, and meet with first responders and local officials. He will also meet with first responders and officials in South Carolina. The President will also visit Florida and Georgia in the coming days. The Vice President will travel to Georgia today and North Carolina in the coming days.
 
Yesterday, President Biden received a briefing from his Homeland Security Advisor Liz Sherwood-Randall and leaders across his Administration, including Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan, Department of Defense Deputy Secretary Kathleen Hicks, Department of Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves, Department of Energy Deputy Secretary David Turk, U.S. Army Corps of Engineer LTG William H. (Butch) Graham Jr., Small Business Administration Deputy Administrator Dilawar Syed, Department of Agriculture Under Secretary Robert Bonnie, and Department of Health and Human Services Assistant Secretary Dawn O’Connell.
 
Additional updates on the Administration’s response efforts include:
 
Mobilizing Defense Department Resources to Support Prompt and Effective Hurricane Response
 
Today, the President is announcing he has directed the Department of Defense to deploy up to 1,000 active-duty soldiers to support response efforts. These soldiers are part of an Infantry Battalion Task Force, based out of Fort Liberty, North Carolina, which includes a Forward Support Company with the necessary support structure (fuel, water, mechanics, etc.) to conduct operations.
 
These soldiers are in addition to the support the Department of Defense is already providing to FEMA for the response to Hurricane Helene including:

  • US Army and US Navy helicopters, soldiers, and sailors to provide critical capability to move personnel and supplies in areas where access via roads is not available or viable.
    • US Air Force aircraft, helicopters, and airmen to provide search-and-rescue capabilities.
    • US Army soldiers and high wheeled vehicles to move personnel and supplies over roads and terrain damaged or impassable to normal vehicles.
    • The Army Corps of Engineers is supporting with response efforts with Temporary Power Teams and subject matter experts to support for debris removal, water and wastewater management, and bridge inspections. 

At the President’s direction, the Department of Defense has activated 22 helicopters to aid in search and rescue operations and provided dozens of high-water vehicles. The National Guard, in its state capacity, is also aiding these efforts. 700 National Guard from North Carolina are supporting debris removal, air lifts, and search and rescue. They are accompanied by National Guard from eight additional states under Emergency Mutual Assistance Compacts, with helicopters and rescue vehicles to further assist with road clearance, commodities, transport, and search and rescue.

Although not operating under Department of Defense authority, over 6,000 National Guard personnel from 12 states are spearheading the response effort across the impacted region in support of their Governors, providing critical life-saving and life-sustaining support to the victims of this unprecedented natural disaster.

Supporting On-The-Ground Response and Emergency Efforts

More than 4,800 personnel from across the Federal workforce are deployed and supporting state-led response efforts across the region. FEMA and other agencies have more than 1,200 personnel in North Carolina, with more resources and staff arriving daily.

Search and rescue efforts by state, local, and Federal partners are ongoing, and nearly 600 additional personnel are arriving in the region in the coming days, increasing the total number of Urban Search and Rescue personnel to over 1,250.

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra declared Public Health Emergencies for South Carolina, Tennessee, Florida, Georgia, and North Carolina. These declarations give the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services’ health care providers and suppliers greater flexibility in meeting emergency health needs of Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries. HHS has established a National Disaster Medical System medical treatment site at the Mission Hospital campus in Asheville and Blue Ridge Regional Hospital in Spruce Pines, North Carolina. HHS Health and Medical Task Force Teams are supporting state medical needs shelters in Hickory and Mills Springs, North Carolina. An HHS Incident Management Team is working closely with state officials to identify health care needs including in rural communities and areas which may be cut off from transportation systems. HHS has also deployed two Disaster Mortuary Assistance Team (DMAT) to assist state mortuary services in mortuary care of victim identification. HHS has made 9 DMAT teams available nationwide. Additionally, 200 Federal ambulances have been provided to North Carolina.

In total, FEMA has shipped over 8.5 million meals, more than 7 million liters of water, 150 generators and over 220,000 tarps to aid response efforts for this historic storm.

Restoring Power and Communications to Impacted Communities

Power outage numbers are improving as restoration teams from across the nation gain access to communities and debris is removed, although much more work remains to bring power back to badly impacted areas across the region. As of this morning, approximately 1.6 million customers are still without power, which is a reduction of more than 65% from the region-wide peak of 4.6 million on September 27.

In addition to intensive efforts to restore power, crews are working around the clock to restore cell service and communications to impacted communities. FEMA, the FCC, and private telecommunications providers are working together to help restore temporary communications as quickly as possible by establishing temporary cell sites and allowing for roaming where possible, where a resident can connect to any network available, even if they aren’t subscribed to that network.

FEMA has provided 50 Starlink satellite systems to help with responder communications and 65 satellite phones have been shipped to assist with communications.

Restoring Road Access

The Department of Transportation activated its 24-hour toll-free Routing Assistance Hotline to provide routing assistance for first responders conducting relief missions. The Hotline supports the movement of Federal, state, local, Tribal, and Territorial response personnel and contractors, equipment, and goods by providing recommended safe routes using a variety of data sources. To reach the Hotline, responders can call 511 from their mobile phones or 833–99-ROADS (833-997-6237).  The Department of Transportation also announced that with the President’s approval of Emergency Disaster Declarations it has initiated a 14-day period of emergency regulatory relief from Federal Motor Carrier Safety regulations, including maximum driving time for property- and passenger-carrying vehicles from the date of declaration. This allows truck drivers to get essential supplies to affected areas. 

Extending Housing Aid to Impacted Families

Following President Biden’s approval of a Major Disaster declaration in North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Florida, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) began implementing supplemental assistance, which includes a 90-day moratorium on foreclosures of FHA-insured mortgages and mortgages guaranteed under the Section 184 Indian Home Loan Guarantee program, as well as an automatic 90-day extension for Home Equity Conversion Mortgages.

Anyone whose home has been destroyed or severely damaged is also eligible to apply for HUD mortgage insurance. HUD is also enabling homeowners to finance rehabilitation and repairs for damaged homes.

To support households and communities through disaster recovery, HUD will provide Housing Counseling assistance and offer waivers and additional flexibilities to Public Housing Agencies, Tribes, and recipients of designated federal funding to allow communities to use existing resources to aid in response and recovery efforts. Additionally, HUD offered a suite of waivers and alternative requirements to allow impacted communities to use existing community development and homelessness assistance funds to aid in response and recovery efforts.  

Approving Additional Emergency Assistance

President Biden has now also approved Major Disaster Declarations for Georgia and Virginia, allowing individuals in 41 counties in Georgia and 6 in Virginia to apply for FEMA assistance. Administration officials are in touch with Georgia emergency management officials, and based on their ongoing assessments of impacts on the ground, FEMA is in the process of approving federal assistance for additional counties. This is in addition to approving Major Disaster declarations for Florida, North Carolina, and South Carolina earlier in the weekend.

To date, more than $10 million in Individual Assistance has been provided to survivors who have been affected by Hurricane Helene, and we expect that number to increase over the coming days. In North Carolina, through the expedited Serious Needs Assistance program, FEMA has paid out more than $1 million to over 1,400 households in less than 24 hours.

FEMA assistance in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia can include a one-time $750 payment to help with essential items like food, water, baby formula and other emergency supplies. After registering for disaster assistance, individuals may also qualify to receive disaster-related financial assistance to repair storm-related damage to homes and replace personal property, as well as assistance to find a temporary place to stay. Homeowners and renters with damage to their home or personal property from previous disasters, whether they received FEMA funds or not, are still eligible to apply for and receive assistance for Hurricane Helene.

FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are deployed to Florida and North Carolina to help survivors register for disaster assistance, visiting shelters and going door to door to help people get Federal assistance where they need it as quickly as feasible.

Biden Administration, Climate Change, News & Photo Features

FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration’s Continued Response to Hurricane Helene, State by State Update

President Joe Biden gives an update on the federal response to the devastating havoc caused by Hurricane Helene © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com via MSNBC

This update Biden-Harris Administration’s continued response efforts after the havoc wreaked by Hurricane Helene across multiple states for days, one of the deadliest storms ever to hit is provided by an administration official.

The National Weather Service reported Helene made landfall in the Big Bend area of the Florida Gulf Coast as a Category 4 storm late in the evening of September 26, 2024.  Although slowly weakening as it moved north across the Deep South and then northwestward across the southern Appalachians, Helene caused significant impacts across a large portion of the Southeast U.S., especially around the southern Appalachians. It brought record wind and rain, lines of tornadoes.

While FEMA has attributed Helene’s severity to the ongoing climate crisis, Donald Trump dismisses climate change as a “scam” and didn’t mind disrupting rescue and recovery efforts underway in order to showboat a photo opp in a devastated Georgia community, actually lying about the Biden-Harris administration’s response and outreach to Georgia Governor Brian Kemp and others and charging that the Biden administration discriminates against sending disaster aid to red states (which is what Trump did throughout his presidency. And be reminded that Trump pressured Speaker Johnson to shutdown government unless he got a law requiring voters to prove their citizenship attached to the budget authorization, which would have left these communities without any assistance whatsoever. Trump is the last one to criticize federal response when his “help” to Puerto Rico after devastating Hurricane Maria was to toss paper towels and give the contract to rebuilt the power infrastructure to a Montana crony.

Trump advocates shutting down NOAA, the Weather Service and Hurricane Preparedness (because they provide evidence of human-caused climate change). Trump, who pulled the US out of the Paris Climate Accord in his first term and reversed Obama’s climate initiatives) also promised Big Oil donors that if they ponied up $1 billion, he would reverse Biden’s historic climate actions, and his answer to everything from inflation to housing affordability is “drill baby, drill.”

In contrast, “Vice President Kamala Harris canceled her West Coast campaigning and headed straight to FEMA headquarters in DC to do what she’s always done — confront the existential threat of climate change head-on. Through her unwavering support for the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act and the 2021 infrastructure law, Harris has championed investments in environmentally friendly programs and resources, showcasing a dedication to safeguarding our planet for future generations,” the progressive organization Indivisible writes.

“Trump’s legacy of environmental deregulation and his current ambitions to dismantle vital agencies like the National Weather Service pose a direct threat to our nation’s ability to respond to climate-related disasters — such actions would leave us blindsided in the face of future crises, rendering the unconscionable notion of being unprepared a reality.”

The Biden-Harris Administration continues to lead a robust Federal response to help impacted communities in the wake of Hurricane Helene. The Administration is working around the clock and mobilizing every resource available to support life-saving response efforts in North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Georgia, and Florida.
 
The President and Vice President continue to receive regular briefings from their teams, including today, and Administration officials remain in constant communication with state and local officials to ensure they have the support and resources they need. President Biden has spoken with North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, Georgia Governor Brian Kemp, South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster, and Asheville Mayor Esther Manheimer, along with other state and local officials in the impacted areas to offer further assistance as needed. This afternoon, the President was briefed by Governor Cooper and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell from the field following surveys of Helene’s impacts across the State. Vice President Harris also received an in-person briefing at FEMA today and has been in touch with Governor Cooper, Governor Kemp, Greenville Mayor Knox White, and Savannah Mayor Van Johnson.
 
President Biden directed Administrator Criswell to determine what more can be done to accelerate delivering support to those who are having the most difficult time accessing assistance in isolated communities. At the President’s direction, Administrator Criswell has been on the ground to survey damage and determine any unmet needs, and at the President’s direction she will remain on the ground in Asheville, North Carolina, until the situation has stabilized.

An administration official provided this update as of October 1:

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in North Carolina

Latest updates as of October 1:

  • At the Direction of President Biden, FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell is in North Carolina and will remain there until the situation has stabilized. FEMA and other agencies have more than 1,200 personnel in North Carolina, with more resources and staff arriving daily.
    • President Biden plans to visit North Carolina on Wednesday to survey the damage, receive a briefing at the State Emergency Operations Center and participate in an aerial tour of Asheville.Yesterday, the White House reached out to over 130 officials in North Carolina and Georgia.
    • After President Biden approved a Major Disaster declaration for North Carolina over the weekend, people in 25 counties in North Carolina can now apply for assistance with FEMA. More counties may be declared in these states as damage assessments continue.
  • People can apply in three ways: online by visiting disasterassistance.gov, calling 1-800-621-3362 or on the FEMA App.
    • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are deployed to North Carolina to help survivors register for disaster assistance, answer questions and help people jumpstart their recovery. Team members will be visiting shelter locations to help survivors without cell service or power be able to begin their application.
    • FEMA assistance in may include funds to help with essential items like food, water, baby formula and emergency supplies. Funds may also be available to repair storm-related damage to homes and personal property, as well as assistance for a temporary place to stay.
    • Homeowners and renters with damage to their home or personal property from previous disasters, whether they received FEMA funds or not, are still eligible to apply for and receive assistance for Hurricane Helene.
  • Power restoration crews continue working 24 hours a day throughout parts of North Carolina. Generators, mutual aid crews and additional power restoration assets are being moved into the hardest hit areas as debris removal allows.
    • The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services teams are working in North Carolina, one team started emergency department decompression at Mission Hospital in Asheville and is treating patients. Another team is moving to Blue Ridge Regional Hospital in Spruce Pine to support emergency department decompression mission. Additionally, 200 federal ambulances have been provided to the state.
    • With 10 search and rescue teams on the ground, another nine teams are arriving today for more than 900 personnel to assist with these efforts. 
    • Together with local and state responders, teams have rescued or supported more than 1,130 in North Carolina.
    • The U.S. Coast Guard crews have saved 21 lives and five pets in the response so far, with rescues continuing in North Carolina.
    • The U.S. Department of Energy has responders deployed to North Carolina to assist restoration efforts.
    • Two FEMA Incident Management Assessment Teams are in North Carolina. The team will coordinate directly with the state to facilitate requests for assistance.
    • So far, 25 trailer-loads of meals and 60 trailers-loads of water have been delivered to the state to support response efforts. More trailer loads of meals and water will be delivered in the coming days.
    • A C-17 cargo plane full of food, water and other commodities has arrived at the forward operating base in Asheville, with a daily flow of commodities established via air bridge.
    • There are 29 shelters open with over 1,000 occupants. 
    • 40 Starlink satellite systems are available to help with responder communications and an additional 140 satellites are being shipped to assist with communications infrastructure restoration.
    • One Starlink will be deployed per county EOC to assist with communications and continuity of government.
    • Generators are moving from Charlotte-Mecklenberg to Asheville, with another 30 generators enroute to the staging base in Mecklenburg.
    • Disaster Medical Assistance Teams are in Asheville providing emergency room medical support at hospitals.
    • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are going to the field, focusing on shelters, where they will assist survivors in applying for assistance.
    • The Salvation Army is coordinating with county emergency management agencies and partner organizations. North Carolina’s Incident Management Team is activated, with two canteens in Boone and Buncombe County.

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in Georgia

Latest updates as of October 1:

  • President Biden approved a Major Disaster declaration for Georgia, allowing individuals in 41 counties to apply for FEMA assistance. More counties may be declared as damage assessments continue.
  • People can apply in three ways: online by visiting disasterassistance.gov, calling 1-800-621-3362 or on the FEMA App.
  • Yesterday, the White House reached out to over 130 officials in North Carolina and Georgia.
    • Power restoration crews continue working 24 hours a day throughout parts of Georgia. Generators, mutual aid crews and additional power restoration assets are being moved into the hardest hit areas as debris removal allows.
    • FEMA supplied over 500,000 meals primarily to Macon-Bibb County. 
    • FEMA is trucking in 2,500 gallons of gasoline a day to help alleviate potential fuel issues in hard hit communities. 
    • The U.S. Department of Energy has responders deployed to Georgia to assist restoration efforts.
    • A FEMA Incident Management Assistance Team is onsite at the state Emergency Operations Center to coordinate with the state and facilitate any requests for assistance.
    • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are going to the field, focusing on shelters, where they will assist survivors in applying for assistance.
    • The American Red Cross, in coordination with FEMA and the Department of Health and Human Services are supporting shelter operations.  Eight shelters are open, supporting 519 survivors.
    • FEMA and the Federal Communications Commission are working with commercial carriers to augment or have telecommunication systems restored.
    • USDA’s Farm Service Agency personnel are traveling to impacted areas to extend emergency credit to farmers and agriculture producers who lost crops and livestock. 
    • The Salvation Army is coordinating with county emergency management agencies and partner organizations. In Georgia, meal services are underway in Valdosta, Alma, Vidalia, with six units serving Chatham County and Augusta.

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in Florida

Latest updates as of October 1:

  • The White House has reached out to more than 200 federal, state, and local officials across Florida over the last few days to offer support and gauge additional assistance needs.
    • FEMA Disaster Survivor Assistance teams are in Florida neighborhoods and shelters helping people apply for FEMA assistance after Hurricane Helene.
    • Two FEMA Incident Management Assistance Teams are onsite at the state Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee to coordinate with the state and facilitate any requests for assistance.
    • 30 FEMA Division Supervisors are embedded in 21 Florida county Emergency Operations Centers.
    • All federal Urban Search and Rescue teams have been released from the state to assist other affected states, specifically the Asheville area in North Carolina.
    • Disaster Recovery Centers are operating in Hillsborough, Manatee and Sarasota counties to provide one-on-one help to Floridians affected by Hurricane Helene.
    • On September 28, President Biden approved a major disaster declaration for the state of Florida, allowing survivors to immediately access funds and resources to jumpstart their recovery. People in 17 counties in Florida can now apply for assistance with FEMA. People can apply in three ways: online by visiting disasterassistance.gov, calling 1-800-621-3362 or on the FEMA App.
  • FEMA assistance in Florida may include upfront funds to help with essential items like food, water, baby formula and other emergency supplies. Funds may also be available to repair storm-related damage to homes and personal property, as well as assistance to find a temporary place to stay.
    • Florida homeowners and renters in 17 counties who had uninsured damage or losses caused by Hurricane Helene may be eligible for FEMA disaster assistance.
    • FEMA may be able to help with serious needs, displacement, temporary lodging, basic home repair costs, personal property loss or other disaster-caused needs. Homeowners and renters in Charlotte, Citrus, Dixie, Franklin, Hernando, Hillsborough, Jefferson, Lafayette, Lee, Levy, Madison, Manatee, Pasco, Pinellas, Sarasota, Taylor and Wakulla counties can apply.

Biden-Harris Administration Updates on Hurricane Helene Response in South Carolina

Latest updates as of October 1:

  • President Biden has spoken with South Carolina Governor Henry McMaster.
    • President Biden approved a Major Disaster declaration for South Carolina this weekend, allowing survivors to immediately access funds and resources to jumpstart their recovery. 
  • FEMA assistance in South Carolina may include a one-time $750 payment to help with essential items like food, water, baby formula and other emergency supplies. After registering for disaster assistance, individuals may also qualify to receive disaster-related financial assistance to repair storm-related damage to homes and replace personal property, as well as assistance to find a temporary place to stay.
    • Homeowners and renters with damage to their home or personal property from previous disasters, whether they received FEMA funds or not, are still eligible to apply for and receive assistance for Hurricane Helene.
    • People in 13 counties in South Carolina can now apply for assistance with FEMA. People can apply in four ways: online by visiting disasterassistance.gov, calling 1-800-621-3362, on the FEMA App, or via disaster recovery centers.
  • Emergency declarations were also approved for South Carolina. Under an emergency declaration, FEMA provides direct Federal support to states for life saving activities and other emergency protective measures, such as evacuation, sheltering, and search and rescue.
    • A FEMA Incident Management Assistance Team is onsite at the state Emergency Operations Center in Columbia to coordinate with the state and facilitate any requests for assistance.
    • HHS declared a public health emergency for South Carolina to address the health impacts of Hurricane Helene.
    • Two Urban Search and Rescue teams are working near Greenville and Pickens.
    • 10 shelters are open with a total of 63 survivors seeking shelter there. Additionally, there are 10 medical shelters active in the state.

On Wednesday, President Biden will travel to North Carolina. He will also travel to Georgia and Florida as soon as possible.

Additionally, the Federal government is closely monitoring an additional weather disturbance in the Caribbean Sea that has the potential to form into another storm in the coming week. Residents throughout the Gulf Coast should remain alert, listen to local officials, and make additional preparations as needed.

Biden Administration, Education, News & Photo Features

FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Announces Additional Actions to Drive Academic Success for all Students

Public School in Queens, NY. The Biden-Harris Administration believes that public education is the bedrock of our democracy and the foundation of opportunity in our country—and that every young person should have the chance to learn, grow, and pursue their dreams. Since Day One, the Biden-Harris Administration has focused on improving academic achievement, increasing student attendance and engagement, and building communities where all students feel they belong and can thrive. That’s why the Biden-Harris Administration made the single-largest investment in K-12 education in history. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

While rightwing MAGA extremists want to shut down universities, weaken public education, and impose their White Christian Nationalist curriculum (as Florida Governor Ron DeSantis has done) – banning books and rewriting curriculum to whitewash history – the Biden-Harris Administration recognizes public education “is the bedrock of our democracy and the foundation of opportunity in our country” and “every young person should have the chance to learn, grow and pursue their dreams.” The administration has worked to bolster academic achievement, particularly address learning losses that followed the coronavirus pandemic, and has made the single largest investment in K-12 education in history. This fact sheet, outlining additional actions the administration is taking to drive academic success for all students, was provided by the White House: – Karen Rubin/[email protected]

The Biden-Harris Administration believes that public education is the bedrock of our democracy and the foundation of opportunity in our country—and that every young person should have the chance to learn, grow, and pursue their dreams.

Since Day One, the Biden-Harris Administration has focused on improving academic achievement, increasing student attendance and engagement, and building communities where all students feel they belong and can thrive. That’s why the Biden-Harris Administration made the single-largest investment in K-12 education in history—and it is delivering results, including student achievement gains. A Harvard and Stanford study, for example, for example, examined outcomes in districts that received large amounts of federal COVID-19 relief funding, which ranged from approximately $4,000 to more than $13,000 per student, and found that these investments will pay for itself in increased earnings for students who benefit, with particularly large impacts for students in schools with high rates of poverty. These investments not only improve academic achievement, but other student outcomes. Another economic study shows that a 10% increase in per student spending each year for all 12 years of public school leads to about 7% higher wages in adulthood, with more pronounced effects for students from low-income backgrounds.
 
As students across the country head back to school, the Biden-Harris Administration is working to make sure America’s schools have the resources and supports they need to continue their important progress. Working together, at the federal, state, and local level, we must all double-down on strengthening reading and math skills; increasing student attendance and engagement; providing afterschool and expanded learning programs; and increasing access to intensive tutoring. We must also provide teachers and school leaders with evidence-based preparation, development, coaching, and resources to support student academic success and literacy and math and their overall well-being, which is foundational to that success.
 
As part of our ongoing commitment to support student success, today we are announcing the following Administration actions:

  • Awarding $149 million to support states in implementing evidence-based reading interventions, including efforts to ensure every child is reading fluently by third grade. The U.S. Department of Education’s Comprehensive Literacy State Development grant program supports states in creating comprehensive literacy programs and providing professional development to advance literacy skills, including pre-literacy skills, reading, and writing, for children and youth, focusing on underserved students, including students from low-income backgrounds, English learners, and children with disabilities. For example, Ohio will partner with state colleges and universities to better prepare educators to deliver evidence-based literacy instruction, and Montana will use funds to expand reading instructional skills for educators in rural communities.
    • Awarding $30 million to support comprehensive assessment systems that inform teaching and support learning. The U.S. Department of Education’s Competitive Grants for State Assessments program supports high-quality state assessment systems that measure student achievement and progress using multiple measures and gives insight into student learning, helping to inform instruction and support student achievement. For example, Nebraska will use funds to support English Learners by making assessment data more usable and actionable for educators as they design instruction. Issuing new school improvement guidance focused on evidence-based practices to support students and educators and accelerate academic achievement. To further support states and districts in their efforts to increase student success, the U.S. Department of Education is issuing school improvement guidance to support effective implementation of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act. The guidance provides examples of evidence-based approaches to support teaching and learning and drive student achievement. This includes addressing chronic absenteeism (for example, through early warning systems and improved family engagement, like home visits and effective parent communication such as texting), and providing high-quality tutoring (in small groups, 2-3 times per week by a well-prepared tutor, during the school day, and aligned with classroom instruction), and afterschool, expanded, and summer learning programs. This draft guidance is open for public comment until October 4, 2024. The Department will consider this community input and issue updated guidance by the end of the year.
       Releasing a new resource for educators on evidence-based strategies for increasing student literacy and math achievement. The Institute of Education Sciences is releasing a resource for educators on instructional strategies for increasing student success in literacy and math. Each resource includes concrete practices that can be used by teachers from early grades to high school, and provides links to additional resources that can support learning at home.  To support states, districts, schools, and families in addressing chronic absenteeism and increase student engagement, the Administration is: Calling on Governors and state education leaders to create statewide student data systems that provide chronic absenteeism-related data for all schools that are actionable, help target interventions, and drive improvement. The Administration encourages all state leaders to ensure that every school district in their state has the real-time data they need to identify and reduce chronic absenteeism and improve student success. States including Alabama, Connecticut, Indiana, and Rhode Island have developed innovative statewide student information systems to help increase student attendance. At a minimum, state systems are encouraged to provide:
      • to the public, up-to-date rates of chronic absenteeism and whether rates are declining or increasing;to educators, real-time, school-level data that enables them to identify the root causes of chronic absenteeism, select the appropriate interventions, target resources, and measure effectiveness; andto parents and families, real-time information on their child’s attendance. 
      Calling on industry vendors that provide student information systems to improve the availability and utility of student attendance data. This includes making attendance data available to states and districts at no additional cost; not charging districts to access, securely export, or display their own data; and adopting industry aligned data standards or practices for student attendance data that allows for interoperability between the modules that states and districts use, between vendors, and between districts that may use different data systems. To support these efforts, this year, the Department of Education will issue a resource for state leaders highlighting different state approaches to creating and implementing data systems to address chronic absenteeism along with recommendations for states and local leaders. The guide will also include information on how federal funding can be used to support these efforts.  Founding the Student Attendance and Engagement Solutions Network, part of the National Partnership for Student Success (NPSS), a partnership among the U.S. Department of Education, AmeriCorps, and the Johns Hopkins University Everyone Graduates Center. The Network supports school districts and states in their efforts to reduce chronic absenteeism, increase student engagement, and enhance prevention strategies for the 2024-25 academic year and beyond. To date, almost 200 school districts across 43 states and eight state education agencies, in total representing more than 11,000 schools and 7.2 million students, have joined the network to learn from each other about how to improve attendance and engagement. The Network is open for districts and states to join. More information on the network and how to join can be found here. Releasing a joint resource by the U.S. Departments of Education and Transportation highlighting ways to provide safe, reliable transit options to get young people to and from school and support everyday student attendance. Many students miss school because of transportation issues, especially in vulnerable communities. To address this issue, transit agencies, school districts, and local and state government leaders can work together to improve transit options for families, including through offering free or reduced transit fares, expanding safe routes to school, and creating a “walking or bike bus”. This resource includes strategies to support students and families in getting to and from school at low or no cost, and federal funding available to support these efforts through the Departments of Education and Transportation. Releasing, this month, a joint resource for parents by the U.S. Departments of Education and Agriculture on how healthy school meals support regular attendance. This resource provides information that schools can use in engaging parents and caregivers on how school meals bolster everyday student attendance and support healthy growth and development and how to access programs. Launching the “Attendance Champions Challenge” to hear directly from young people on creative solutions to address chronic absenteeism. The Challenge, hosted on challenge.gov, will encourage state and local leaders to directly engage young people (ages 13-19) in sharing barriers to regular school attendance and proposing viable, creative solutions to support their attendance and engagement. The Challenge is open until November 29th and more information can be found at this website. 

In addition to these actions by the Administration, a number of organizations have taken action to tackle absenteeism, as previewed during the White House Every Day Counts Summit. These actions include a messaging toolkit for states, districts, and educators based on new research around effectively communicating with parents to increase student attendance, developed by the Ad Council Research Institute (ACRI), with support from Overdeck Family Foundation, available on September 10th. Information on additional actions by organizations is available here.
 
These resources build on the previous Administration actions to promote academic achievement and student success, including:
 

  • Securing $130 billion for the largest-ever investment in public education through state and district funding in the American Rescue Plan (ARP). ARP has been used to help schools safely reopen, and address the academic, mental health, and other needs of students. ARP funding has put more teachers in our classrooms and more support staff in our schools; expanded high-dosage tutoring; led to record expansion of summer and after-school programs; improved HVAC systems; and increased access to a wide range of student supports. The most recent data shows that states and districts have allocated more than $70 billion to activities that address students’ academic, social, and emotional needs, including tutoring, afterschool, and summer learning, and research is showing that these investments are working. 
    • Enabling states to continue investing pandemic relief funds into academic achievement efforts in the 2024-25 school year and focus remaining resources on improving outcomes. The Department issued a letter, Frequently Asked Questions, and a template to support States and provide a critical pathway to continue to use ARP dollars in the 2024-2025 school year, including on evidence-based academic and other student supports.  

[i] The White House does not endorse any nonfederal entity, product, service, or publication. Links to websites and resources outside the U.S. Federal Government are being provided as a convenience and for informational purposes only; they do not constitute an endorsement or an approval by the White House of any of the products, services or opinions of the corporation or organization or individual. The White House bears no responsibility for the accuracy, legality or content of the external site or for that of subsequent links. Contact the external site for answers to questions regarding its content.

Biden Administration, Climate Action, Climate Change, News & Photo Features

FACT SHEET: President Biden Commemorates Historic Climate Legacy during Climate Week NYC

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson addresses the 2024 Clinton Global Initiative, which prioritizes climate action, environmental protection and climate justice, about the crucial role that NASA plays in assessing climate change. The Biden-Harris Administration has made a whole-of-government commitment to addressing climate change and environmental justice. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

During Climate Week, President Biden delivered remarks highlighting his climate, conservation, clean energy, and environmental justice agenda, which is lowering costs, creating good-paying and union jobs, and reducing harmful emissions.
 
As the latest historic hurricane event pummels the Southeast, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, who routinely calls Climate Change a hoax, promises to “drill baby drill” and pulled the US out of the Paris Climate Agreement, and Republican governors in Florida, Texas, South Carolina deal with climate change by outlawing the term,  House Republicans continue reckless attempts to roll back climate, conservation, and clean energy investments – even proposing to shut down NOAA, which gives warnings of weather events.

This fact sheet reviewing President Biden’s historic climate legacy was provided by the White House:

When President Biden took office, he pledged to restore America’s climate leadership at home and abroad. Every day since, the Biden-Harris Administration has led and delivered on the most ambitious climate, conservation, clean energy, and environmental justice agenda in history, including securing the largest ever climate investment and unleashing a clean energy manufacturing boom that has attracted hundreds of billions of dollars in private sector investment; created hundreds of thousands of new clean energy jobs; and lowered energy costs for families while delivering cleaner air and water for communities across the country.
 
As business leaders, government officials, young people, and other advocates from around the world gather in New York City to participate in Climate Week, tomorrow President Biden delivered remarks in New York City highlighting his Administration’s unprecedented progress in tackling the climate crisis, cutting energy costs for everyday Americans, and creating good-paying union jobs.
 
Meanwhile, as President Biden and Vice President Harris continue to implement their Investing in America agenda, many Congressional Republicans continue to deny the impacts of climate change and are actively working to roll back this Administration’s historic and urgent climate investments – in fact, House Republicans have voted more than 50 times to repeal parts of President Biden’s climate investments. The contrast couldn’t be clearer.
 
From replacing toxic lead pipes and modernizing our electric grid to reducing air pollution and conserving our nation’s lands and waters, President Biden and Vice President Harris have positioned America to lead the global effort against climate change and protect the health, safety, and economic vitality of our communities and our environment for generations to come. 
 
Biden-Harris Administration’s Top Climate Accomplishments
 
Deploying Clean, Affordable Electricity and Strengthening America’s Power Grid
Through the Inflation Reduction Act and Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, President Biden has secured unprecedented investments in a clean power sector, unleashing a boom in American solar, wind, battery storage, nuclear, and other clean energy technologies that are creating good-paying jobs and saving families money on utility bills. President Biden’s Investing in America agenda is supporting the U.S. offshore wind industry, transmission buildout and other power grid upgrades, residential solar for low-income households, investments in clean electricity across rural America, efficient permitting to get new projects built, and American manufacturing of clean energy technologies. Since the start of the Biden-Harris Administration, the US has added more than 100 gigawatts of new clean energy – enough to power more than 25 million homes. Thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, clean energy project developers get access to expanded tax incentives if they pay workers prevailing wages and employ registered apprentices,  build their projects with domestic content, or locate projects in historic energy communities—provisions that are helping make more clean energy jobs good-paying and union jobs, supporting American manufacturing, and driving clean energy investment to the places that can benefit the most.
 
Bolstering Climate Resilience and Adaptation
The Biden-Harris Administration is taking a whole-of-government approach to addressing climate impacts, including through Federal climate adaptation planning and integrating consideration of climate impacts into Federal policies, programs, and funding. The Administration released a National Climate Resilience Framework and President Biden secured more than $50 billion for climate resilience and adaptation investments that are upgrading aging roads and bridges, including critical evacuation routes; restoring critical waterways, forests, and urban greenspaces; building forest health and reducing wildfire risk; bolstering water infrastructure and drought resilience across the American West; reducing the risk to federal assets from future floods; and modernizing our electric grid. Through portals like Climate Mapping for Resilience and Adaptation (CMRA) and Heat.gov, the Administration is equipping communities with the information and resources they need to assess climate risks and implement adaptation actions in their communities. With historic investments from the President’s Investing in America agenda, the Administration stabilized the short-term security of the Colorado River and is making investments to ensure the long-term stability of the Colorado River Basin.
 
Accelerating a Clean Transportation Future
Last year, the Biden-Harris Administration released the National Blueprint for Transportation Decarbonization, a landmark strategy for eliminating nearly all greenhouse gas emissions from the U.S. transportation sector by 2050. The Administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law and Inflation Reduction Act invest tens of billions to decarbonize maritime,  trucking, transit, rail, and aviation, all while making communities more walkable, bikeable, and connected. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law is also investing $7.5 billion to build a nationwide network of convenient, reliable electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure along corridors and within communities, and $5 billion to put clean school buses on our roads. In addition, the President rallied automakers and autoworkers around a historic goal of having electric vehicles account for at least 50% of new passenger vehicles sold by 2030. To support this goal while driving down consumer costs, the Administration secured tax credits that reduce the cost of new or used clean vehicles by thousands of dollars directly at the dealership as well as tax credits to deploy EV charging and alternative fueling infrastructure to support clean vehicle deployment needs for individuals and businesses within rural and low income communities. The Administration is also leading by example to electrify the federal vehicle fleet, including 66,000 U.S. Postal Service delivery vehicles over five years.
 
Cutting Energy Costs and Pollution at Homes, Schools, and in Communities
Last year, 3.4 million American families saved $8.4 billion from IRA home energy tax credits for heat pumps, insulation, solar, and other clean energy technologies, and today states across the US are rolling out IRA rebates of up to $14,000 per household to help low- and middle-income families afford cost-saving electric appliances and energy efficiency improvements. The President established a $20 billion national clean energy financing network that will support tens of thousands of clean energy projects and cost-saving retrofits, reducing or avoiding up to 40 million metric tons of carbon pollution annually over the next seven years. The Biden-Harris Administration has also strengthened energy efficiency standards to save households and businesses money, with standards updated by DOE for dozens of appliances expected to provide nearly $1 trillion in consumer savings over 30 years, saving the average household more than $100 a year while also reducing greenhouse gas emissions by more than 2 billion metric tons. Schools across the country are using IRA clean energy tax credits and elective pay to install solar, energy storage, and ground source heat pumps.

Revitalizing American Manufacturing for the Clean Economy
President Biden’s Investing in America agenda has helped catalyze historic manufacturing growth, with factories opening across the nation. The private sector has committed over $910 billion in investments in American manufacturing and clean energy, including sectors central to our industrial strength. The President’s agenda is helping to make U.S. manufacturing the cleanest and most competitive in the world. The Inflation Reduction Act is investing more than $6 billion to slash climate pollution and support workers and community health at U.S. factories producing the steel, aluminum, cement, and other materials that form the backbone of our economy, nearly $2 billion to support shuttered or at-risk auto facilities retain or re-hire workers to support manufacturing in the electric vehicle supply chain, over $3 billion to bolster battery manufacturing, and over $4 billion through the Federal Buy Clean Initiative to bolster markets to buy cleaner materials. The Biden-Harris Administration’s historic steps to reduce super-polluting methane and hydrofluorocarbons are also harnessing American innovation and creating good-paying union jobs. 
 
Advancing Environmental Justice
Since Day One, the Biden-Harris Administration has prioritized a whole-of-government approach to environmental justice. The President signed a historic Executive Order that mobilizes the federal government to bring clean energy and healthy environments to all and mitigate harm to those who have suffered from pollution and environmental burdens like climate change. Through the Justice40 Initiative, over 500 programs across 19 federal agencies are being reimagined and transformed to maximize the benefits of President Biden’s unprecedented investments – from clean energy projects to floodwater protections to wastewater infrastructure – to communities that need them most. At the same time, the Administration is taking unprecedented action to protect communities from PFAS pollution, accelerate Superfund and brownfield cleanups, tighten standards for hazardous air pollutants, and enhance air quality enforcement. To ensure the voices, perspectives, and lived experiences of communities with environmental justice concerns are heard in the White House and reflected in federal priorities, policies, investments, and decision-making, President Biden also created the White House Environmental Justice Advisory Council.
 
Delivering Clean Water and Replacing Lead Pipes
President Biden and Vice President Harris are fighting to ensure a future where every American has access to clean, safe water. The President’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law invests over $50 billion in upgrading the nation’s water infrastructure – the largest investment in clean water in American history. The Administration has already launched over 1,700 projects to expand access to clean drinking water, replace lead pipes, improve wastewater and sanitation infrastructure, and remove PFAS pollution in water. The Biden-Harris Administration invested over $1 billion from the President’s Investing in America agenda to specifically accelerate the delivery of drinking water and community sanitation infrastructure projects in Indian Country, where almost 50% of communities are lacking this basic human right. President Biden has also made a commitment to replace every toxic lead pipe in the country within a decade, protecting families from lead poisoning that can irreversibly harm brain development in children.

Empowering Every Community to Advance Climate Solutions
The historic set of federal actions that the Biden-Harris Administration has taken are supporting communities across the country in seizing opportunities in the clean energy economy. The Administration has mobilized billions of dollars in investment in the energy communities and workers that have powered our nation for generations. To help young people access skills-based training for good-paying careers in the clean energy and climate resilience economy, the Administration launched the American Climate Corps, which will mobilize a new, diverse generation of more than 20,000 Americans. And with direct support from the Administration’s Investing in America Agenda, more than 45 states and more than 200 Tribes, territories, and metro areas have now developed their own Climate Action Plans. All of these foundational efforts will support climate solutions in the near-term and for years to come, helping the nation achieve the goal of reducing climate pollution by 50-52% below 2005 levels in 2030 and reaching a net-zero economy by no later than 2050.


Conserving our Lands and Waters
President Biden’s America the Beautiful initiative is supporting and accelerating voluntary, locally led conservation and restoration efforts across the country, and with 42 million acres already protected under President Biden, the U.S. is on track to meet the first-ever national goal to conserve at least 30 percent of our lands and waters by 2030. The Biden-Harris Administration has established or expanded eight national monuments and restored protections for three more; created five new national wildlife refuges and significantly expanded five more; established two new national marine sanctuaries and begun the process to designate or expand protections for five more; created one new national estuarine research reserve; protected the Boundary Waters of Minnesota, the nation’s most visited wilderness area; safeguarded Bristol Bay in southwest Alaska from the impacts of mining; protected the Arctic Ocean from oil and gas development; and withdrawn Chaco Canyon in New Mexico and Thompson Divide in Colorado from further oil and gas leasing which will protect pristine lands and thousands of sacred sites. The Administration also directed the conservation of old-growth and mature forests, put conservation on equal footing with development in managing our public lands, launched the America the Beautiful Freshwater Challenge to protect, restore, and reconnect 8 million acres of wetlands and 100,000 miles of our nation’s river and streams, protected vast areas of caribou habitat in the Western Arctic for future generations, and is advancing the Chumash Heritage National Marine Sanctuary off the coast of California.
 
Rallying Leaders of the World’s Largest Economies to Raise Global Climate Ambition
President Biden has restored America’s climate leadership at home and abroad. Under his leadership, the Administration is securing commitments from more than 155 countries to reduce methane emissions by at least 30 percent by 2030; successfully galvanizing other countries at COP28 to commit, for the first time, to transition away from unabated fossil fuels, stop building new unabated coal capacity globally, and triple renewable energy globally by 2030 and nuclear energy by 2050; launching a new Clean Energy Supply Chain Collaborative to work with international partners to diversify supply chains that are critical to a clean and secure energy transition; mobilizing other governments to follow the U.S. lead and commit to achieve net-zero government emissions by 2050 through a new Net-Zero Government Initiative; and becoming a world leader in innovative debt-for-nature swaps that have helped countries restructure over $2 billion in debt and unlock hundreds of millions of new financing for nature and climate.
 
Accelerating Federal Permitting to Deliver Clean Energy and Infrastructure More Quickly
The Biden-Harris Administration has taken action to accelerate clean energy infrastructure and deliver other critical projects by securing and directing long overdue resources to improve and accelerate permitting and environmental reviews. The Administration also finalized the Bipartisan Permitting Reform Implementation Rule to address climate change, protect public health, encourage better environmental outcomes, and promote meaningful public input on Federal decisions and projects.
 
House Republicans Continue Attempting to Roll Back Climate Protections
As President Biden and Vice President Harris implement the most ambitious and impactful climate and conservation agenda in history, House Republicans are taking action right now that would roll back investments in climate, clean energy, and public health. House Republicans’ efforts to gut climate protections through a variety of avenues – including appropriations bills, Congressional Review Act resolutions, and other legislative actions – would raise consumer energy costs, undermine public health protections, worsen the impacts of extreme weather events, and destroy environmental safeguards for our lands and waters.
 
Ongoing attempts by Congressional Republicans to roll back climate and environmental protections would:
 
Raise Consumer Energy Costs, including by:

  • Attempting to eliminate funding for the development of U.S. manufacturing capabilities in vehicles, trains and locomotives, maritime vessels including offshore wind support vessels, and aircraft.

 
Gut Public Health Protections, including by:

  • Trying to overturn Biden-Harris Administration rules that protect communities from coal plants’ water pollution, air pollution, and waste disposal.
  • Trying to overturn a Biden-Harris Administration rule that will reduce by 96% the number of people with elevated cancer risk near certain chemical plants, by reducing emissions of toxic chloroprene and ethylene oxide from those facilities.
  • Rolling back the Clean School Bus program that will reduce climate pollution and provide cleaner air for our nation’s children.
  • Undermining clean air progress by trying to overturn rules that reduce pollution from power plants, cars and trucks , and industrial sources.
  • Taking steps to block new Biden-Harris Administration rules to protect coal and other miners from toxic silica dust.

Destroy Protections for Our Lands and Waters, including by:

  • Trying to eliminate Presidential authority to establish national monuments altogether.
  • Working to dismantle President Biden’s America the Beautiful Initiative.
  • Threatening to expose cherished landscapes to new drilling, including 13 million acres of special areas in the Western Arctic.
  • Planning to reduce accountability for oil and gas companies.
Biden Administration, Climate Action, Energy, Environmental Protection, Infrastructure, News & Photo Features

FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Takes Action to Deliver More Projects More Quickly, Accelerates Federal Permitting

To date, the Biden-Harris Administration has deployed more than $560 billion in federal investments for over 68,000 projects across the nation, and the President has taken action to accelerate these projects by devoting long overdue resources to permitting and environmental reviews in order to deliver projects that deliver clean, renewable energy © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

The Biden-Harris Administration has consistently been about getting things done, though rarely breaking through the media fog focused on the latest Trump scandal and outrage. This fact sheet on how Biden is accelerating infrastructure projects that address the urgent need to transition to clean energy and provide jobs is provided by the White House:

President Biden has been clear that the government can and must deliver more projects, more quickly. Through his Investing in America Agenda, he is delivering on that promise by accelerating project reviews while protecting communities and our environment.
 
To date, the Biden-Harris Administration has deployed more than $560 billion in federal investments for over 68,000 projects across the nation, and the President has taken action to accelerate these projects by devoting long overdue resources to permitting and environmental reviews.
 
The Biden-Harris Administration has taken historic steps to accelerate and improve the federal permitting process so that Americans across the country can benefit from the promise of the Investing in America agenda – including lowering energy costs for families and creating hundreds of thousands of good-paying and union jobs. The Administration has taken a three-prong approach. First, investing $1 billion through the Inflation Reduction Act funds to hire experts and invest in new technologies to expedite reviews. Second, passing the first reforms to modernize the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) for the first time in 50 years and finalizing the Bipartisan Permitting Reform Implementation Rule to accelerate the federal environmental review process. And third, using executive authorities, wherever possible, to improve permitting and environmental review processes.
 
Today, the Biden-Harris Administration is announcing two new actions that will help build more projects, more quickly. 

  • The Bureau of Land Management is announcing a roadmap to support expanded solar energy production by making renewable energy siting and permitting on America’s public lands more efficient. This action will help expedite reviews of solar projects by steering them to areas with high solar potential and low wildlife and land conflicts, and ease burdens on solar developers. The Bureau of Land Management will make over 31 million acres of public lands across eleven western states available for solar development, helping to deliver clean power to millions of homes.
     
  • The Environmental Protection Agency is announcing the conditional approval of a new rule which will allow for new offsets to create clean air credits in Maricopa County. Companies with vehicle fleets can now generate credits by replacing or retrofitting diesel-burning vehicles with electric vehicles. Manufacturers or other new emitters can then purchase those credits to balance out their future emissions. This will allow the county, which is now a center of semiconductor manufacturing in the U.S., to continue to build semiconductor fabs essential to our nation’s future and ensure that residents continue to have clean air.

 Delivering Results
 
The Administration’s actions to reform federal permitting have already delivered real results. New data from the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) and federal agencies demonstrates that the Biden-Harris Administration is delivering more projects, more quickly while being responsible stewards of the environment and protecting communities.
 
The Biden-Harris Administration has cut 6 months off the median time it takes for agencies to complete environmental impact statements, the most comprehensive form of environmental review, representing 16% in time savings compared to the previous Administration and we are continuing to make more improvements.
 
Data indicates that there are similar results across a number of key sectors: 

  • Clean Energy & Transmission: The Department of Energy has cut environmental review timelines by half for environmental impact statements compared to the prior Administration. In addition, DOE has completed 15% more environmental reviews compared to the previous Administration.  In addition, the Department of Energy has started implementing the Coordinated Interagency Authorization and Permits (CITAP) program which is expected to cut review times in half for transmission projects.
     
  • Transportation: The Department of Transportation (DOT) has cut the average time it takes to complete an environmental assessment by more than one third. DOT has also completed 20% more reviews compared to the prior Administration for projects requiring environmental assessments or environmental impact statements.
     
  • Offshore wind: Under the Biden-Harris Administration, the Department of the Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management has completed environmental reviews for the nation’s first 10 commercial-scale offshore wind projects; before President Biden took office there were zero complete. Because of the Administration’s progress on permitting the nation’s first offshore wind projects and leasing new areas, the total U.S. offshore wind project pipeline now exceeds 80 gigawatts, enough to power more than 26 million homes if fully developed.
     
  • Onshore renewable energy: Under the Biden-Harris Administration, the Department of the Interior has permitted more than twice as many clean energy projects on public lands than it did under the prior Administration. Together, these projects are expected to help power more than 12 million homes across the country.
     
  • Broadband: Across the federal government, agencies are processing more than twice as many permits for high-speed internet projects on federal lands and property as they did under the prior Administration. NTIA has established and adopted a total of 36 new categorical exclusions to streamline processes, including for historic preservation and threatened and endangered species compliance for broadband.

 Additionally, for projects with minimal environmental impacts, the Biden-Harris Administration has expanded use of the fastest form of environmental review – categorical exclusions. Since the start of the Administration, over 15 federal agencies have developed, expanded, or adopted 125 categorical exclusions for projects with insignificant environmental impact in key sectors such as EV charging, broadband, semiconductor manufacturing, clean energy, and transmission. This includes new categorical exclusions adopted using new permitting efficiencies passed by Congress in the Fiscal Responsibility Act.  
 
Federal agencies are using categorical exclusions to review the vast majority of project decisions, including 99% of federal highway decisions. This is an increase from the last time similar data was analyzed by the Government Accountability Office (GAO), which found that just 96% of Federal Highway Administration projects were processed by categorical exclusions. Other agencies are also utilizing categorical exclusions for the vast majority of projects including 99% of Department of Energy decisions, and 98% of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) projects decisions.
 
New Executive Actions to Accelerate Permitting
 
The Biden-Harris Administration has taken a number of steps in recent weeks to improve federal permitting processes to help advance projects critical to the President Biden’s Investing in America Agenda.
 
Streamlining Historic Preservation Reviews: Earlier this month, the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation (ACHP) proposed a Program Comment to accelerate historic preservation reviews for millions of clean energy, transportation, housing, and building projects over the next two decades. This action builds on steps that ACHP announced earlier this year to accelerate historic preservation reviews for broadband projects.
 
Accelerating Transmission Projects: The Biden-Harris Administration has started to implement the new Coordinated Interagency Transmission Authorizations and Permits (CITAP) program which will help accelerate permitting for transmission projects to bring reviews down to a two-year timeline – twice as fast as the historical average of four years. A recent study of 33 projects found that had CITAP been in place from 2010 through 2020, it could have saved the equivalent of approximately 66 years in federal permitting time. The Department of Energy (DOE) recently opened the portal for transmission developers and project sponsors to apply for the CITAP program. In addition, the Department of Energy recently announced $371 million for 20 projects across 16 states to accelerate the siting and permitting of high-voltage interstate transmission projects and support community infrastructure projects.
 
Expanding Categorial Exclusions: In recent weeks, the U.S. Forest Service adopted 10 categorical exclusions that will accelerate its review of broadband projects. Data from the U.S. Forest Service indicates that these categorical exclusions will help streamline reviews for 100 broadband projects by 2027, thereby saving over $24 million in staff time per year and lead to a total reduction of over 20 years in processing time. In April the Bureau of Land Management adopted categorical exclusions to accelerate review of geothermal projects. And, earlier this month, the Department of Transportation announced a new categorical exclusion to help expedite reviews of projects dedicated to fixing older, leak-prone natural gas pipelines.
  
Modernizing NEPA Technology: Last month CEQ released new recommendations for using technology to modernize environmental reviews. In a new report to Congress CEQ evaluates permitting processes, include an analysis of 16 different agency technology tools and initiatives being advanced to improve the environmental review and permitting process.

Biden Administration, Health Care, News & Photo Features

FACT SHEET: Biden-⁠Harris Administration Announces New, Lower Prices for First Ten Drugs Selected for Medicare Price Negotiation to Lower Costs for Millions of Americans

President Joe Biden, at the State of the Union Address, touts Medicare’s ability for the first time to negotiate prices with Big Pharma, a win for seniors who will pay significantly less, and for Medicare, saving $1.5 billion the first year © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com via MSNBC.

New negotiated drug prices are expected to save millions of seniors and other Medicare beneficiaries $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket costs in the first year of the program alone. This fact sheet was provided by the White House:

For far too long, Americans have paid more for their prescription drugs than any developed nation. Today, the Biden-Harris Administration is delivering on its promise to lower out-of-pocket drug costs for seniors and save money for Americans. That’s because Medicare has the power to negotiate prescription drug prices for the first time in history thanks to the Inflation Reduction Act, which was signed into law by President Biden with Vice President Harris casting the tie-breaking vote. Because Medicare is now able to negotiate lower prescription drug prices for seniors and people with disabilities, American taxpayers are expected to save $6 billion on prescription drug costs, and people enrolled in Medicare are expected to save $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket costs in 2026 alone. President Biden and Vice President Harris took on Big Pharma and won, and now millions of seniors and others on Medicare will soon see their drug costs go down on some of the most common and expensive prescription drugs that treat heart disease, cancer, diabetes, blood clots, and more.


HHS Announces Negotiated Prices for Medicare Drugs

HHS has reached agreements with all participating manufacturers on new negotiated, lower drug prices for the first 10 drugs selected for the Medicare drug price negotiation program. After manufacturers have steadily increased the list prices of all 10 of these drugs since they went on the market, these new prices will cut the list price of these drugs between 38 and 79 percent.

The new prices will go into effect for people with Medicare Part D prescription drug coverage in 2026:

Drug NameCommonly Treated ConditionsNumber of Medicare Enrollees Who Used the Drug in 2023Drug List Price in 2023 for 30-day SupplyNegotiated Price for 2026 for 30-day SupplySavings (%)
EliquisPrevention and treatment of blood clots3,928,000$521$231$290 (-56%)
JardianceDiabetes; Heart failure; Chronic kidney disease1,883,000$573$197$376 (-66%)
XareltoPrevention and treatment of blood clots; Reduction of risk for patients with coronary or peripheral artery disease1,324,000$517$197$320 (-62%)
JanuviaDiabetes843,000$527$113$414 (-79%)
FarxigaDiabetes; Heart failure; Chronic kidney disease994,000$556$178.50$377.50 (-68%)
EntrestoHeart failure664,000$628$295$333 (-53%)
EnbrelRheumatoid arthritis; Psoriasis; Psoriatic arthritis48,000$7,106$2,355$4,751 (-67%)
ImbruvicaBlood cancers17,000$14,934$9,319$5,615 (-38%)
StelaraPsoriasis; Psoriatic arthritis; Crohn’s disease; Ulcerative colitis23,000$13,836$4,695$9,141 (-66%)
Fiasp; Fiasp FlexTouch; Fiasp PenFill;
NovoLog; NovoLog FlexPen; NovoLog PenFill		Diabetes785,000$495$119$376 (-76%)

Source: CMS, https://www.cms.gov/files/document/fact-sheet-negotiated-prices-initial-price-applicability-year-2026.pdf

These ten drugs are among those with highest total spending in Medicare Part D. If the negotiated prices had been in effect during 2023, Medicare would have saved an estimated $6 billion. When the negotiated prices go into effect in 2026, people enrolled in Medicare Part D are estimated to save $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket costs.

Millions of Part D enrollees that depend on these treatments to treat life-threatening conditions including diabetes, heart failure, and cancer are also expected to see lower out-of-pocket costs for these drugs. For example, a Medicare enrollee who takes Stelara for their arthritis and pays $3,459 on their drug today for a 30-day supply would pay only $1,174 in 2026. Many seniors and people with disabilities on Medicare who take these drugs will also benefit from the Inflation Reduction Act’s $2,000 cap on out-of-pocket spending, which will be fully in effect in 2025, saving 19 million beneficiaries an average of $400 per year, in addition to these savings from the negotiated drug prices.

More drugs will be selected each year as part of Medicare’s drug price negotiation program. Medicare will select up to 15 additional drugs covered under Part D for negotiation in 2025, up to an additional 15 Part B and D drugs in 2026, and up to 20 drugs every year after that.

Building on Progress Lowering Health Care Costs

Every day, millions of Americans are saving money on health care costs because of the Biden-Harris Administration’s actions.

  • People with Medicare are saving an average of $70 in out-of-pocket costs on vaccines like shingles and Tdap because President Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act made recommended vaccines free for beneficiaries, including the 10.3 million enrollees who received a free vaccine in 2023.
  • All 3.4 million Medicare Part D enrollees who filled an insulin prescription in 2023 had their insulin costs capped at $35 per month, saving some seniors hundreds of dollars for a month’s supply.
  • Some seniors and other Medicare beneficiaries taking drugs covered under Part B for which manufacturers have hiked prices faster than inflation are saving up to $4,593 in lower coinsurance this quarter thanks to the new Medicare inflation rebates.
  • Starting this year, Part D enrollees no longer pay 5% co-insurance when they reach the catastrophic phase of their benefit and have their out-of-pocket drug costs capped at about $3,500. In just the first quarter of 2024, over 260,000 people benefited from this cap.
  • Millions of American are saving an average of about $800 per year on health insurance premiums because of savings from the American Rescue Plan that the Inflation Reduction Act extended, helping drive the nation’s uninsured rate to historic lows under the Biden-Harris Administration.

Check out the Biden-Harris Administration’s Savings Explorer to see how some of the Administration’s policies are helping Americans save money on annual expenses – from health care to junk fees, grocery costs and more.

Continuing to Lower Prescription Drug Costs

People with Medicare will continue to see their prescription drug costs go down as more provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act go into effect next year. Nearly 19 million seniors and other Part D beneficiaries are projected to save $400 per year on prescription drugs when the out-of-pocket cap drops to $2,000 in 2025, and 1.9 million enrollees with the highest drug costs will save an average of $2,500 per year. And the lower prices negotiated for the high-spend drugs announced today will go into effect in 2026.

The President’s Budget for Fiscal Year 2025 builds on this success by significantly increasing the pace of negotiation, bringing more drugs into negotiation sooner after they launch, expanding the $2,000 out-of-pocket prescription drug cost cap beyond Medicare and into the commercial market, and other steps to build on the Inflation Reduction Act drug provisions. The Budget also includes proposals to curb inflation in prescription drug prices and extends the $35 cost-sharing cap for monthly prescriptions of insulin to the commercial market to lower drug costs for all Americans.


Statement from President Joe Biden on Lower Prescription Drug Prices

For years, millions of Americans were forced to choose between paying for medications or putting food on the table, while Big Pharma blocked Medicare from being able to negotiate prices on behalf of seniors and people with disabilities. But we fought back – and won.
 
Today, for the first time in history, my Administration is announcing that Medicare has reached agreements on new, lower prices with the manufacturers of all 10 drugs selected for the first round of drug price negotiation. When these lower prices go into effect, people on Medicare will save $1.5 billion in out-of-pocket costs for their prescription drugs and Medicare will save $6 billion in the first year alone. It’s a relief for the millions of seniors that take these drugs to treat everything from heart failure, blood clots, diabetes, arthritis, Crohn’s disease, and more – and it’s a relief for American taxpayers.
 
This historic milestone is only possible because of the Inflation Reduction Act, which passed with the leadership of Democrats in Congress, and with Vice President Harris casting the tie-breaking vote in the Senate – without a single Republican voting for it. We showed that major progress can be made for the American people when we work together to take on special interests, even as Big Pharma continues to go to court to try to block lower prices for consumers. But the Vice President and I are not backing down. We will continue the fight to make sure all Americans can pay less for prescription drugs and to give more breathing room for American families.

Statement from Vice President Kamala Harris on Lower Prescription Drug Prices

Every American should be able to access the health care they need no matter their income or wealth. That is why President Biden and I fought to lower the costs of health care with our Inflation Reduction Act, transformational legislation that I was proud to cast the tie-breaking vote on in the Senate. During the two years since President Biden signed this landmark bill into law, we have cut prescription drug costs, capped the cost of insulin at $35 a month, and lowered premiums for seniors and people with disabilities on Medicare – helping millions of families get the care they deserve.

Today, we are building on our work to lower costs and increase access to affordable prescription drugs by announcing that the Biden-Harris Administration has reached agreements with all participating manufacturers to lower prices for the first 10 drugs selected for the Medicare price negotiation program – from those that treat cancer to those that treat diabetes, heart disease, and blood clots. Thanks to our historic work to allow Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices, millions of Americans who rely on these drugs will save on their out-of-pocket costs. While people enrolled in Medicare are expected to save $1.5 billion in 2026 alone, American taxpayers will also save an estimated $6 billion.

Today’s announcement will be lifechanging for so many of our loved ones across the nation, and we are not stopping here. Additional prescription drugs will be selected each year as part of our Medicare drug price negotiation program. This includes up to 15 additional drugs covered under Medicare Part D for negotiation in 2025, up to an additional 15 Part B and Part D drugs in 2026, and up to 20 drugs every year after that.

From my time as Attorney General of California and a U.S. Senator, I have consistently worked to lower the costs of prescription drugs and fought to protect patients. As Attorney General, I held Big Pharma accountable for their deceptive and illegal practices. The record-breaking settlements that I won – for the people – amounted to more than $7 billion against pharmaceutical companies for their unsafe and unfair tactics. President Biden and I will never stop fighting for the health, wellbeing, and financial stability of the American people.

Biden Administration, News & Photo Features

Amid Record Declines in Crime Nationwide, Governor Hochul Highlights Statewide Decline as New York Communities Ranked Among Safest in Nation

New York State Governor Kathy Hochul, in Glen Cove, delivers good news on dramatic reductions in crime on Long Island, and historic increases in state spending on local law enforcement © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

As Trump, Vance and the Republicans continue to lie about crime rates rising under the Biden-Harris Administration, the FBI and police officials released figures that show record declines, especially in violent crime which soared during Trump’s failed administration.

Last year, violent crime fell to a near 50-year low as murder rates fell 13% nationally and plummeted in major cities. This trend is continuing in 2024, with violent crime and the murder rate on track for the sharpest decrease in history.

This morning, new data in major cities from the Major Cities Chiefs Association show violent crime dropping further. The Harris Campaign pointed to declines in battleground states:

The decline in crime due to the actions of the Biden-Harris Administration and its investments in community policing is being felt throughout the country.

President Joe Biden stated, “When Vice President Harris and I took office, our nation had just seen the largest increase in murders ever recorded during the previous Administration. Immediately, we got to work to make communities safer. Today, new data confirms that our efforts are working and violent crime is at a 50-year low. An independent organization of police chiefs from across our nation’s biggest cities released data showing that violent crime fell across every category in the first half of 2024. Homicides are down 17% – building on the largest-ever decline in the homicide rate nationally last year.
 
“This did not happen by accident. Our American Rescue Plan – opposed by every Republican in Congress – delivered $15 billion to cities and states to invest in public safety and violence prevention, keeping cops on the beat while working with community leaders to interrupt and prevent crime. I also signed the most significant gun violence legislation in nearly 30 years which is keeping guns out of dangerous hands by expanding background checks and helping states implement “red flag” laws.
 
“Americans are safer today than when Vice President Harris and I took office. We can’t stop now. That’s why I will continue to urge Congress to fund 100,000 additional police officers and crime prevention and community violence intervention programs, and make commonsense gun safety reforms such as a ban on assault weapons.”

Meanwhile, it is Trump who has demonstrated his willingness to defund police. As president, Trump proposed a $400 million cut to local law enforcement funding and oversaw the largest single-year spike in the murder rate in more than a century. Trump has  demanded  the defunding of federal law enforcement, while proposing using the FBI and Justice Department to go after his political enemies. His vice presidential pick JD Vance said, “I hate the police.”  His Republican allies in Congress are calling to defund the Department of Justice, the FBI, the CIA, cut funding for cybersecurity

U.S. News & World Report Ranked Counties in Long Island, Hudson Valley and New York City Among the Top 25 Safest in America

Crime in New York State Is Down 6% Year over Year

Governor Hochul Has Invested over $800 Million in Crime-Fighting Initiatives

In New York State, for example, where Republican Nassau County Executive Bruce Blakeman, trying to position himself for elevation in Republican ranks fear-mongers on crime rates), Governor Kathy Hochul today highlighted ongoing declines in statewide crime as a new independent report ranked New York communities among the safest in the nation based on violent crime rates, emergency services and other key metrics. Eight counties across New York State, including counties in Long Island, the Hudson Valley and New York City, were recognized in the U.S. News & World Report ranking of “The Top 25 Safest Communities in America” – more than any other state in the nation. Four counties were among the top ten, and one county – Nassau – was ranked the safest in the nation.

“Public safety is my top priority and I’ve been laser-focused on fighting crime from the moment I took office,” Governor Hochul said. “Our approach is working, as murders, shootings, violent crime and property crime have declined statewide. But make no mistake: our work is not over, and I’ll continue working to ensure our state is safer for all.”

New York’s nation-leading performance in this new ranking reflects a broad and ongoing decline in crime. Statewide crime is down 6% year over year, according to data from both the New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services and NYPD CompStat.

The U.S. News & World Report analysis recognized the following counties among the Top 25 Safest in America – with many of them seeing significant year-over-year declines in crime for the first half of 2024:

  • Long Island: Nassau – 18% decline; Suffolk – 13% decline
  • Hudson Valley: Rockland – 26% decline; Westchester – 8% decline; Putnam – 15% decline in 2023 (2024 data pending)
  • New York City: Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island – combined 3.5% decline

As New York continues to make nation-leading progress in tackling crime, Governor Hochul has also continued to make historic investments in new crime-fighting initiatives statewide, amounting to more than $800 million in investments in tested programs and initiatives.

The Governor’s investments also include nationally recognized initiatives administered by the state Division of Criminal Justice Services (DCJS), which provides funding, training and technical assistance to law enforcement agencies and community-based organizations in communities hardest hit by gun violence and violent crime:

  • Nearly $36 million for the Gun Involved Violence Elimination (GIVE) initiative. Through GIVE, DCJS helps 28 police departments in 21 counties implement evidence-based strategies that have proven to be successful at reducing gun violence, including Problem-Oriented Policing, Hot-Spots Policing, Focused Deterrence/Group Violence Intervention, Street Outreach, and Crime Prevention through Environmental Design. These strategies focus on the few people and places that are responsible for most of the violence and engage the broader community to build trust. GIVE also funds district attorneys’ offices, probation departments, and sheriffs’ offices in those counties.
    • $21 million for the SNUG Street Outreach program, which uses a public health approach to address gun violence by identifying the source, interrupting transmission, and treating individuals, families and communities affected by violence. Community-based organizations and hospitals operate the program in 14 communities and employ nearly 200 outreach workers, social workers and case managers. Outreach workers are credible messengers who have lost loved ones to violence or have prior justice system involvement. They respond to shootings to prevent retaliation, detect conflicts, and resolve them peacefully before they lead to additional violence. Social workers and case managers work with individuals affected by community violence, including friends and family. DCJS also supports New York City’s violence interruption efforts, providing $5 million for its Crisis Management System (CMS) so it can bring those programs to scale.
    • $18 million for the state’s unique network of Crime Analysis Centers, which analyze, compile and distribute information, intelligence and data to local law enforcement agencies statewide. No other state has anything similar and the centers – operated in partnership with local law enforcement agencies in 10 counties and New York City – are hubs of state and local efforts to deter, investigate, and solve crimes. Last year alone, staff handled more than 90,000 requests for assistance, helping agencies solve everything from retail theft to murders.
    • Up to $20 million for Project RISE, a unique funding model that convenes community stakeholders to respond to gun violence, invest in solutions, sustain positive programming, and empower communities. In its first year, the initiative supported 99 organizations, including 74 small, grassroots programs, many of which had never received state support fort their work. Programs and services funded by RISE include academic support, employment services, mentoring, and delinquency/violence prevention.

“Governor Hochul’s comprehensive investment in programs and strategies to address the pandemic-era increase in crime is paying dividends,” New York State Division of Criminal Justice Services Commissioner Rossana Rosado said. “The DCJS budget is the largest in its history, allowing us to provide record-level funding to law enforcement agencies and community-based organizations addressing the causes and consequences of crime. I want to recognize our local partners for their tremendous efforts and my staff for their commitment to this important work.”

See also:
Facts Belie Republican Lies about Democrats’ Record on Crime, Immigration

 __________________________

© 2024 News & Photo Features Syndicate, a division of Workstyles, Inc. All rights reserved. For editorial feature and photo information, go to www.news-photos-features.com, email [email protected]. Blogging at www.dailykos.com/blogs/NewsPhotosFeatures. ‘Like’ us at facebook.com/NewsPhotoFeatures, Tweet @KarenBRubin

Child Care, Poverty

FACT SHEET: Biden-Harris Administration Actions to Keep Children and Families Safely Together and Supported

The White House hosts a convening on transforming child welfare and announces new policy to prevent family separation due to poverty

 

President Joe Biden  and Vice President Kamala Harris believe every child should have the opportunity to reach their full potential and grow up in a safe and loving home with their families. The White House announced new policies that focus on preventing family separation and supporting and creating opportunities for families and youth. © Karen Rubin/news-photos-features.com

The President and Vice President believe every child should have the opportunity to reach their full potential and grow up in a safe and loving home with their families. Over four million families are referred to child protective services each year, and around 200,000 children enter foster care.  Child welfare systems are prepared to step in when a child’s safety is at risk, but they are frequently tasked with intervening when families are simply impoverished and could  be best helped in the long run by helping meet their economic and service needs. Since Day One, the Biden-Harris Administration has been committed to improving child and family well-being by keeping families together safely, including through helping connect them to community and economic supports, increasing the use of kinship care, and improving foster care so that when it is needed, it preserves and strengthens lasting emotional bonds.
 
Today, the White House hosted a convening on transforming child welfare to announce new policies that focus on preventing family separation and supporting and creating opportunities for families and youth. The convening brought together policymakers across federal, state, local, and tribal governments, philanthropy, child welfare and family support organizations, and young people and families who have personal experiences, to encourage further innovation, build new partnerships, and exchange best practices. The new announcements focus on four key areas:
 
Separating Poverty and Neglect
Children should not be separated from their families due to financial hardship alone. Several states, like Kentucky, Indiana, South Carolina, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Washington, and Kansas have already clarified that poverty alone should not cause child removal. And there is emerging evidence connecting these actions to improvements in family outcomes. The Biden-Harris Administration is encouraging states to follow their lead and make clear the distinctions between child maltreatment and financial hardship. Today, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) is:

  • Issuing new policy guidance that encourages states to update their maltreatment definitions under the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act to exclude the inability to provide adequate housing, child care and other material needs if the family has insufficient financial means to do so from the definition of child neglect. The state should first seek to help the family. 
  • Committing to develop guidance on training mandated reporters so that they recognize the need to connect economically fragile families to supports and know these changes to neglect definitions.

 
Prevention Services
Prevention services, including services to help families economically and provide parenting and behavioral health treatment, need to be well resourced, tailored to best meet the needs of families and grounded in evidence. New Biden-Harris actions will expand how states and Tribes can use federal funding for prevention activities to provide greater assistance to children and families before a crisis point. These actions include new policies to:  

  • Provide more flexibility to Tribal governments to use Tribally accepted prevention services when they collaborate with state child welfare agencies.
  • Permit federal administrative funding to help families get to and engage with prevention programs, such as case management, peer navigation and transportation to help families engage with services. Policy will also clarify how federal funds can support evaluations of interventions and activities that improve service implementation.
  • As well as, forthcoming new guidance on ways to integrate and leverage the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program to prevent involvement in the child welfare system.

 
Prioritizing Kin and Youth Needs
Children who cannot be with their parents but live with relatives and other kin have better outcomes than those who are not, including in stability, behavioral health, and education. New Biden-Harris actions will incentivize jurisdictions to do more to ensure children can live with kin, and meet youth needs by:

  • Allowing child welfare agencies to draw on federal funds to finance background check operations to facilitate quicker licensing for kin and others who provide foster care.
  • Rolling out a new website spotlights states and Tribes that have adopted new kinship licensing rules, as well as data on their kinship placement rates.
  • Publishing a resource guide on federal programs that provide supports to grandparents and kin in their caregiving roles. 
  • Conducting a series of listening sessions to identify federal flexibilities needed for states and Tribes to adopt kinship licensing rules and kinship first approaches.

 
Innovations and Research
The Biden-Harris Administration is committed to further developing actionable research on the intersection between prevention, family support and child well-being outcomes. HHS announced several projects that:

  • Highlight innovative prevention approaches that rely on service integration and agency collaboration to prevent homelessness among youth aging out of foster care and to build family resilience.
  • Enable researchers to study linked Medicaid and child welfare data to understand the health needs of children and parents involved in child welfare.
  • Examine the characteristics and experiences of certain families who relinquished or voluntarily placed their children in child welfare custody to better identify the needs for community-based behavioral health and disability services.

 
THE BIDEN-HARRIS RECORD ON CHILD WELFARE
 
The Biden-Harris Administration has a long record of actions consistent with its commitment to keeping families together safely, providing supports as an alternative to child removals, and increasing the use of kinship care and other foster care best practices:

  • Accelerating uptake of the Title IV-E Prevention Program. This groundbreaking program provides open-ended funding for proven approaches to keeping children with their families.  This Administration has approved 38 prevention plans, bringing the total to 42 states, the District of Columbia, and four Tribes. 
  • Expanding evidenced-based services to use in the Prevention Program.  This month HHS announced changes to the title IV-E Prevention Services Clearinghouse review procedures that will enable the review and approval of diverse new programs that can be funded through the Prevention Program, beyond the 85 already approved.  These changes clarify how services that include economic supports can be reviewed, offer more flexible evaluation designs to meet evidence standards, and create more engagement and transparency in the review process.
  • Respecting Tribal sovereignty. The Administration expanded the scope of Public Law 102-477 plans, which now deliver over $300 million in flexible funding to 298 Indian Tribes to strengthen the economic stability and mobility of families in Indian Country – including by braiding child welfare funding with workforce funding to help preserve families. And just over a year ago, the President celebrated the Supreme Court’s decision in Haaland v. Brackeen, which upheld the Indian Child Welfare Act as a necessary safeguard to ensure that whenever possible, children should be kept with their extended families or community.
  • Expanding home visiting. The Administration has doubled total authorized funding for home visits from $400 million in FY 2022 to $800 million by FY 2027 in the Maternal, Infant, and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program and quadrupled funding to $48 million to Tribes over the same period, increasing efforts that can identify challenges facing families and enable solutions that keep children healthy and families together.  Most recently, HHS announced $3 million in grant funding to six new tribal entities for a home visiting programs to support and promote the well-being of expectant families and those with young children in Indigenous communities.
  • Prioritizing kinship care. In September 2023, HHS issued a final rule that allows a child welfare agency to adopt simpler licensing or approval standards for all kin foster family homes. The rule also requires that states provide kinship caregivers with the same level of financial assistance that any other foster care provider receives, an important step forward to strengthen the financial security of kinship families. In April 2024, HHS hosted a national convening on kinship care to highlight innovative strategies to bolster kinship care. Six states and three Tribes have taken up the kinship licensing rules in the first six months, and three more are pending approvals to do so.  
  • Supporting young people in foster care. HUD has increased public housing authority uptake of the Foster Youth to Independence Program, which provides housing vouchers for up to three years for older youth transitioning from foster care. Since the beginning of the Biden-Harris Administration, HUD awarded $60.3 million, providing 4,364 vouchers for older youth. HHS also funded 11 state and Tribal demonstration grants to test community approaches to prevent youth from becoming homeless. And USDA and HHS are working to ensure that young people experiencing homelessness or transitioning out of foster care can keep their SNAP benefits without work reporting requirements, as secured by the President through the Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2023.
  • Protecting parents and children with disabilities from discrimination. HHS issued a final rule to protect parents and children with disabilities involved with the child welfare system. The final rule seeks to ensure that children with disabilities are served in the most integrated setting appropriate to their needs, and that parents and prospective parents do not face discrimination in visitation, reunification, child placement, and other child welfare services based on stereotypes about their disability.
  • Cutting child poverty. The Biden-Harris Administration saved nearly 40 million working families with 65 million children an average of $2,600 by expanding the Child Tax Credit in 2021—helping to cut child poverty nearly in half, lifting 1.2 million Hispanic children, 800,000 Black children, and almost 100,000 Asian American children out of poverty.
  • Providing affordable child care for families. The President has secured nearly a 50% increase in child care funding, keeping providers open during the pandemic and bolstering women’s labor force participation. HHS made changes to the child care subsidy program to lower costs for families with low-incomes by capping their out of pocket child care costs to 7% of their income. 
  • Providing housing relief for families. The Biden-Harris Administration has provided rental assistance to more than 5 million households, including an additional 100,000 low-income families. The Administration established a ceiling for annual rent increases for the two million apartments that are financed by federal tax credits—reducing the maximum allowable annual rent increase for those renters by an average of nearly $500 this year. And during the pandemic, the Administration provided rental assistance to 8 million renters to help pay rent, keep them in their homes, and cover utilities bills.