Mr. President, I am going to be asking shortly for unanimous consent on three bills. The first one is my bipartisan Disaster Assistance Simplification Act, which basically makes a commonsense change…
Mr. President, I am going to be asking shortly for unanimous consent on three bills.
The first one is my bipartisan Disaster Assistance Simplification Act, which basically makes a commonsense change to create a universal application for disaster survivors to more easily navigate the available Federal assistance after they have been hit by a natural disaster.
Currently, disaster survivors must complete separate and detailed applications, often with duplicative questions, which can take weeks and sometimes months to complete--something folks who are suffering from a natural disaster simply don't have the time for, and certainly they need immediate help. The separate processes can be overwhelming to disaster survivors who are just trying to piece their lives back together, causing many to give up on seeking the help they certainly are qualified for.
My bill would simply ask Federal Agencies to design one combined application and work together to share information amongst themselves, with the necessary data-sharing protections in place, to make the obstacles to overcoming a disaster a bit less onerous for folks who are suffering.
I urge my colleagues to join me in passing this bill, which passed through the Senate unanimously in the last Congress. I believe we must make this simple change so that when disaster strikes, disaster survivors can more easily access the assistance they certainly deserve.
The second bill is my bipartisan U.S. Customs and Border Protection Officer Retirement Technical Corrections Act, which ensures that a number of DHS law enforcement officers will receive the retirement benefits that they were promised--that they were promised--when starting their service almost 20 years ago.
In 2008, CBP incorrectly informed a group of newly hired officers that they would be eligible for an enhanced retirement benefit without having to hit a certain retirement age or reach 20 years of service to qualify. CBP realized this mistake a decade later--a full 10 years later--and in 2021, that group of officers abruptly lost access to the retirement package they were promised when they were hired.
This bill directs CBP, along with the Office of Personnel Management, to provide those affected officers the benefits they were promised when they accepted those positions.
None of us would stand for the government telling us after almost 20 years of service that we were not going to receive the benefits we were promised when we began those positions. We shouldn't expect these law enforcement officers to do so either.
This bill is necessary to fix an Agency error that upended the retirement plans of 1,400 officers, including 70 officers who live in my State of Michigan.
Last Congress, the Senate unanimously passed this bill, and I urge my colleagues to support this bipartisan bill once again.
The final bill, the third bill, is my bipartisan, commonsense bill, Helping Eliminate Limitations for Prompt Response and Recovery Act, and is going to repeal section 695 of the Post-Katrina Emergency Management Reform Act of 2006, which limits the length of certain contracts in the aftermath of a disaster.
This bill aligns the Department of Homeland Security with more recent governmentwide rules. Matching DHS with governmentwide requirements will alleviate confusion and streamline the response to and recovery from disasters.
This is a straightforward, good-governance step that will benefit disaster survivors; therefore, I urge my colleagues to join me in passing this bill, which the Senate previously passed by unanimous consent in the 118th Congress.
Mr. President, notwithstanding rule XXII, I ask unanimous consent that the Senate proceed to the immediate consideration of the following bills en bloc: Calendar No. 252, S. 594; Calendar No. 253, S. 727; and Calendar No. 264, S. 861.
Mr. President, I further ask that the bills be considered read a third time and passed and that the motion to reconsider be considered made and laid upon the table with no intervening action or debate, all en bloc.
