Source: United States Senator for North Dakota John Hoeven
WASHINGTON – Senator John Hoeven (R-N.D.) today joined Senator Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) in pressing President Biden to end COVID-19 travel restrictions, including the pre-departure testing requirements for travel to the U.S. and masking requirements for domestic travelers. This comes as the Biden administration today announced that it would be extending the federal mask mandate for domestic travel an additional 30 days to April 18.
The letter is the latest in Hoeven’s efforts to push back on the Biden administration’s overreaching mandates. To this end, the senator has:
- Voted to terminate the COVID-19 national emergency declaration, which was approved in the Senate on March 3.
- Voted to repeal the vaccine mandate on private employers.
- Voted to repeal the vaccine mandate for health care workers.
- Worked to prevent the federal employee and contractor mandates, including repeatedly voting to defund the federal government’s COVID-19 vaccine mandates.
- Cosponsored legislation to repeal the vaccine and mask mandates for Head Start teachers and volunteers..
- Pressed the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary to stop vaccine mandates for USDA employees.
- Cosponsored legislation to end the mask mandate for planes, trains and buses.
- Cosponsored the COVID-19 Vaccine Dishonorable Discharge Prevention Act, which was signed into law as part of the NDAA, to prohibit the Department of Defense from giving servicemembers a dishonorable discharge if they decline to receive the COVID-19 vaccine.
“This is about ending President Biden’s COVID-19 mandates,” said Hoeven. “We’ve pushed back against those mandates from the start, and this latest effort is to end the mandates related to travel on planes, trains and buses. People should be able to make their own decisions.”
In addition to Hoeven and Wicker, the letter was signed by Senators Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Richard Burr (R-N.C.), Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), John Cornyn (R-Texas), Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Steve Daines (R-Mont.), Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska), Joni Ernst (R-Iowa), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.), Mike Braun (R-Ind.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Roy Blunt (R-Mo.), Rick Scott (R-Fla.), John Thune (R-S.D.), James Lankford (R-Okla.), John Boozman (R-Ark.), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), Bill Cassidy (R-La.), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), Todd Young (R-Ind.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), Susan Collins (R-Maine) and Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.V.). The full text of the letter can be found here.
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