25 Governors Urge Biden to End COVID-19 Public Health Emergency

New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu speaks onstage during the 2022 Concordia Lexington Summit—Day 1 at Lexington Marriott City Center, in Lexington, Ky., on April 7, 2022. (Jon Cherry/Getty Images for Concordia)

Twenty-five governors are urging President Joe Biden to end the COVID-19 public health emergency, which has remained in place despite a drop in COVID-19 metrics and the emergence of less virulent variants.

The governors say the emergency phase of the COVID-19 pandemic is and has been over for some time, noting that Biden himself said in September that “the pandemic is over.”

They also pointed out that the Senate in a bipartisan vote in November passed a resolution that would terminate the emergency, though the House of Representatives hasn’t taken up the measure yet.

“We agree with both your statement and the Senate’s resolution – it is time we move on from the pandemic and get back to life as normal,” Gov. Chris Sununu (R-N.H.) and 24 other Republican governors wrote to Biden in a Dec. 19 letter.

The public health emergency is harming states by enabling bloated Medicaid rolls, costing hundreds of millions of dollars, the governors said. Since the beginning of the pandemic, states have added 20 million people to the rolls—an increase of 30 percent. Until the emergency ends, the population covered by Medicaid will continue to grow, regardless of whether people are still eligible, the governors warned.

Under the Families First Coronavirus Response Act, Medicaid programs must keep people enrolled through the end of the public health emergency. In exchange, states received additional federal funding.

Emergency Repeatedly Extended

Then-President Donald Trump declared the public health emergency for COVID-19 on March 13, 2020. The Trump administration extended it multiple times, and the Biden administration has continued extending it since taking control in January 2021.

In the most recent renewal, Health Secretary Xavier Becerra, a Biden appointee, said that a public health emergency (PHE) still exists.

Becerra said he consulted with public health officials before entering the extension.

Top Biden administration officials have said they'll give states 60 days’ warning before ending the emergency.

That promise remains in place, Sarah Lovenheim, assistant secretary for public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services, said in November.

The latest extension took the emergency through Jan. 11, 2023. Since there’s been no warning, the governors are expecting the emergency to be extended yet again. They’re already looking ahead to April 2023.

“We urge you to end the national emergency and the PHE in April and provide states notice of those intentions well in advance to allow us to adequately plan for the future,” the governors wrote to Biden.

The White House didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Some States Act

Some governors, even Democrats, have recently ended state-level emergency declarations.

Washington state Gov. Jay Inslee, for instance, announced in October that the state’s declaration was ending.

Inslee’s administration said that the pandemic still exists but “it’s no longer an emergency thanks to vaccinations, medical treatments, and the innumerable efforts of countless Washingtonians since the state had the nation’s first documented case in January 2020.”

“We’ve come a long way the past two years in developing the tools that allow us to adapt and live with COVID-19,” Inslee said. “Ending this order does not mean we take it less seriously or will lose focus on how this virus has changed the way we live. We will continue our commitments to the public’s well-being, but simply through different tools that are now more appropriate for the era we’ve entered.”

Others have previewed the expiration of an emergency. California Gov. Gavin Newsom, for instance, said that the declaration there would end on Feb. 28, 2023. Nine other states still have emergency declarations in place.

Others rescinded or terminated the declarations in 2021, when cases, hospitalizations, and deaths linked to COVID-19 dropped dramatically, or in early 2022.

Senate Measure

In a rare bipartisan vote, senators passed a measure in November that would terminate the emergency.

“It is with this national emergency declaration, in tandem with other additional powers currently invoked by the president, which this administration is manipulating to super size government powers,“ Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), who sponsored the measure, said on the Senate floor in Washington. ”And now it’s obvious they need these powers to continue their spending spree to enact their radical partisan agenda and grow government dependency through further expansion of our welfare state.”

Thirteen Democrats sided with Republicans to approve the resolution.

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) spoke out against the measure, saying that ending it would undercut the federal government’s ability to deal with the pandemic.

The House hasn’t taken up the measure, versions of which have been approved on three separate occasions by the Senate.

The White House said in a statement that even if the House approved the resolution, Biden would veto it.

“Continuing to protect against COVID-19 and ensuring that our response remains nimble are top priorities of this Administration,” the White House stated, adding that terminating the emergency would “unnecessarily and abruptly curtail the ability of the Administration to respond to COVID-19.”

Congress can override vetoes, but it requires a two-thirds vote in each chamber.