Jon Stewart Continues to Blast Republicans for Not Supporting the 9/11 Victim Fund
Last week, Jon Stewart testified before a House Judiciary subcommittee on behalf of 9/11 survivors and first responders, who are waiting for lawmakers to extend September 11th Victim Compensation Fund. For nearly 10 minutes, the former Daily Show host laid into Congress, only a few members of which attended the hearing. “It would be one thing if their callous indifference and rank hypocrisy were benign, but it’s not,” Stewart said. “Your indifference costs these men and women their most valuable commodity: time. It’s the one thing they’re running out of.”
On Sunday, Stewart, who has long been advocating for 9/11 survivors and first responders, took his case to Fox News. “It’s a very emotional issue,” he told Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday. “I think this community is at the end of their rope. I think there is a feeling of disbelief. They can’t understand why they have to continually have to saddle up and ride down to Washington and make these appeals for something that should be simple, but somehow through politics is made agonizingly difficult.”
The 9/11 Victims Compensation Fund, which is set to expire at the end of 2020, offers compensation to 9/11 survivors and first responders who filed claims relating to various health problems they have experienced as a result of the attacks. Stewart wants the fund to be extended through 2090 so that no one affected by 9/11 will “have to come down, hat in hand, [and] beg for this kind of thing again.”
The House Judiciary Committee later in the week voted to extend the fund through 2090. The full House of Representative is expected to do the same, but there’s fear the fund could get held up in the Senate, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) could hold it hostage as a bargaining chip as he tries to get other bills passed. When McConnell was asked about the fund following Stewart’s testimony last Tuesday, he reacted like it was a wedding he forgot was coming up at the end of the month.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/jon-stewart-blast-republicans-not-supporting-sept-11-victim-fund-848855/
