Defend Public Health Urges Congress: Stand Strong on Health Funding, Even If It Means Shutdown

Stopgap Funding Bill Must Ensure Funds Appropriated by Congress Get Spent 

WASHINGTON, D.C. –  Defend Public Health has sent a letter to House and Senate Leaders urging them not to support a short-term continuing resolution to keep the government open past September 30, 2025 unless provisions are included to protect vital public health and healthcare funding, including funding held up by the Trump administration in plain violation of constitutional provisions giving Congress authority over spending. The letter states, “We cannot stand by and watch further congressional or administrative actions that slash funding, decimate the public health and community-based workforce, replace science-based policy with misinformation, and halt vitally important biomedical research,” urging congressional leaders to take a stand.

DPH Coordinating Committee member and epidemiologist Gregg Gonsalves added, “The administration’s nakedly unconstitutional actions, refusing to spend vital public health dollars already appropriated by Congress, will cost lives. From canceling cancer clinical trials to terminating programs to ensure that our food and water are safe to eat and drink, that we are safe from disease outbreaks and our communities have the tools they need to confront the opioid crisis – this administration is on a rampage of destruction. It’s time for Congress to step in and stop the madness, reclaim its authority and protect their constituents whose health and survival is under attack.”

DPH’s letter states, “The administration must be required to make awards as directed under fiscal year 2025 appropriations law. This must go hand in hand with an immediate halt to further firings of federal employees who are vital to the oversight and granting of these federal dollars.”

The letter also expresses DPH’s strong support for the Senate’s Fiscal Year 2026 Labor, HHS, and Education appropriations bill, reported favorably on an overwhelmingly bipartisan basis by the Senate Appropriations Committee. It further demands the inclusion of provisions to make permanent the premium tax credits established by the Affordable Care Act stating, “Failure to make these tax credits permanent will create significant barriers to health care access for millions of Americans as premiums rise astronomically and health care becomes out of reach for many of the most vulnerable among us.”

DPH Coordinating Committee member Julie Scofield, former longtime executive director of the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors, said , “It’s time to draw a line and protect lives. We need courage from Democrats and Republicans. All of this is wrong and they all know it. We have a rare chance here to throw sand in the gears and stop this senseless mayhem. If members of Congress are willing to fight for what is right, even if it means shutting down the government temporarily, they will keep Americans alive and healthy. Otherwise they are complicit in what this administration has done and will do: make us sicker and condemn people to unnecessary suffering and death.”

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