President Trump on Friday said he had invoked the Defense Production Act, a federal emergency law, to prevent hoarding or export of critical medical gear needed to combat the coronavirus outbreak
Leaders from hard-hit states say they are still not receiving the ventilators and protective medical gear their hospitals desperately need, and are often pitted against each other to procure them, despite the president finally moving to invoke parts of the law designed to coordinate a federal crisis response.
On Capitol Hill, Republican Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner and Democratic Rep. Diana DeGette admonished the Department of Health and Human Services about news that it had failed to provide delivery addresses for 2,000 available ventilators, as well as reports that many ventilators in the strategic national stockpile were broken. And Sen. called on FEMA to create a national database of ventilators and a distribution program to ship them to impacted areas.
But the state leaders and DPA experts say the president’s actions still fall far short of the full authority of the emergency law. Instead of targeting individual companies, they say the DPA could be used to set up a centralized federal system to track the parts, production and distribution of tests and medical goods nationwide.
Amid the confusion, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer pressed Trump on Thursday to appoint a senior military official to lead the response. Trump shot back in an angry letter that the administration already had one — Rear Adm. John Polowczyk, director of FEMA’s supply chain task force. The explanation did not impress Schumer, the Senate’s top Democrat, who told reporters the next day there’s still confusion over who has ultimate authority.
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