Newhouse to Biden: Abandon Your Vaccine Mandate

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, Rep. Dan Newhouse (R-WA) joined Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) and 11 other colleagues in sending a letter to President Biden urging him to drop his plans to mandate a COVID-19 vaccination for essential travelers, such as those engaged in trade and emergency management.

"We write to you expressing our deep concerns over your Administration's plan to require proof of COVID-19 vaccination for essential travelers entering the United States starting in January 2022," wrote the lawmakers. "Such a requirement will have significant negative impacts on essential cross-border trade and exacerbate the severe supply chain disruptions hindering our economic recovery.

They continued, "Our nation is already facing the most significant supply chain disruptions in generations. An ill-conceived policy that would require essential travelers to be vaccinated to enter the United States will only exacerbate our supply chain crisis. As you know, the large majority of goods transiting North America are transported via overland trucking. A vaccine mandate for essential travel will be disruptive to millions of individuals in the trucking industry alone, as well as countless others involved in emergency response and other critical functions.

The lawmakers concluded, "We urge you to abandon this effort to institute such a mandate and work with the Canadian government to ensure no further damage is done to our cross-border economic partnership. After over 20 months of pandemic-related restrictions, it is past time to facilitate a return to normal cross-border travel between the U.S. and Canada."

You can read the full letter here and below.

Dear President Biden,

We write to you expressing our deep concerns over your Administration's plan to require proof of COVID-19 vaccination for essential travelers entering the United States starting in January 2022. Such a requirement will have significant negative impacts on essential cross-border trade and exacerbate the severe supply chain disruptions hindering our economic recovery.

As you know, when the U.S. and Canada mutually agreed to restrict non-essential travel across the U.S. - Canada border in March 2020, essential travel was permitted to continue without restriction. In establishing and extending the restrictions on non-essential travel, the Department of Homeland Security acknowledged that maintaining essential travel throughout the pandemic was necessary so that such restrictions did "not interrupt legitimate trade between the two nations or disrupt critical supply chains that ensure food, fuel, medicine, and other materials reach individuals on both sides of the border." While the number of COVID-19 infections have fluctuated since the onset of the pandemic, we are not aware of any indication or evidence that individuals engaged in essential cross-border travel have had a substantive effect on COVID-19 transmission.

Our nation is already facing the most significant supply chain disruptions in generations. An ill-conceived policy that would require essential travelers to be vaccinated to enter the United States will only exacerbate our supply chain crisis. As you know, the large majority of goods transiting North America are transported via overland trucking. A vaccine mandate for essential travel will be disruptive to millions of individuals in the trucking industry alone, as well as countless others involved in emergency response and other critical functions.

Americans have experienced extraordinary hardships from the sluggish economic recovery, the skyrocketing price of everyday goods due to inflation, and continued supply chain disruptions. As President, you have the power to alleviate these burdens on the American people and ensure that the policies you enact do not worsen the already difficult conditions for millions of citizens. Instituting this vaccine mandate for essential cross-border travel will have profound negative consequences on millions of Americans, as well as on our economy.

We urge you to abandon this effort to institute such a mandate and work with the Canadian government to ensure no further damage is done to our cross-border economic partnership. After over 20 months of pandemic-related restrictions, it is past time to facilitate a return to normal cross-border travel between the U.S. and Canada.

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