By Forum Staff
U.S. Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand (both D-N.Y.) and Sept. 11 community members gathered on Sunday to demand that the Trump administration fully restore key staff for the World Trade Center Health Program.
On Sunday, Schumer said these actions by President Donald Trump are not accidents. Schumer said that these actions appear to be very real choices—bad ones that hurt New York.
Schumer and Gillibrand urged an end to these “games,” and said that the WTC Health Program saves lives, and that recent firings and overall funding threats raise more questions than answers for New York and the nation. The senators said that this chaos is a dereliction of duty by the federal government, a disservice that must be reversed, so that the Sept. 11 health program, its staff, the federal government and the medical professionals can all do their jobs: save lives.
On Friday, amid National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health firings that included critical staff, and Dr. John Howard, Newsday reported that 16 World Trade Center Health Program employees received notices that they could lose their jobs in the Health and Human Services Department’s downsizing, “despite promises the program’s staff would not be reduced.” Benjamin Chevat, executive director of Citizens for the Extension of the James Zadroga Act, told Newsday on Friday that he learned that 16 of the current 86 WTC Health Program staff members had been put on notice that they are in line to be dismissed.
The WTC Health Program provides medical treatment, research, and monitoring to over 137,000 responders and survivors of the September 11th terrorist attacks, living in every state and nearly every Congressional district. The program serves first responders and survivors from the World Trade Center and lower Manhattan, the Pentagon, and the crash site in Shanksville, Pa.
Schumer and Gillibrand worked to establish the WTC Health Program on a bipartisan basis in 2011 with a five-year authorization to provide medical treatment and monitoring for 9/11 responders and survivors suffering from the effects of the toxins at Ground Zero. They worked to reauthorize the program in 2015 and extended through 2090 with bipartisan support. In 2022, Schumer and Gillibrand delivered $1 billion for the program in the end-of-year spending bill, and in 2023, they secured an additional $676 million for the program.
“In the past 24 years since September 11th, 2001 the FDNY has lost 398 heroes to World Trade Center illnesses, and thousands more continue to suffer the effects of their toxic exposure, even with the excellent efforts of the WTC Health Care Programs many more will be lost. These last two interruptions to the program; although reversed, should never have occurred. In December the WTC Health Care Program Funding Correction Bill was agreed upon by a bi-partisan effort and was going to ensure the program would be funded until 2040. That bill was taken out of the Continuing Resolution and it was never restored. This administration needs to make it a top priority that this bill gets passed as soon as possible, so that America can fulfill its promise to ‘Never Forget’ those who suffer and die now, because they answered the call 24 years ago,” said Andrew Ansbro, president of the Uniformed Firefighters Association.
