Press Releases

(Washington, D.C.) – Today, Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-WA) delivered remarks at a hearing on Reauthorizing the Higher Education Act: Opportunities to Improve Student Success. In her remarks, Murray said she would continue to be focused on making sure more students from all...

*WATCH: Murray, Warren call for moving forward on legislation to help working families, Republicans object*   (Washington, D.C.) – Today, Senators Patty Murray (D-WA) and Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) asked unanimous consent to move forward on legislation to expand economic security and stability for working families across the country. The...

Murray: “In Congress, we must act to give workers some much needed relief.  We need to grow our economy from the middle out, not the top down.  And we should make sure our country works for all Americans, not just the wealthiest few.”   (Washington, D.C.) – Today, Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP)...

Murray: “Political attacks and threats to shut down the government aren’t going to get in the way of women’s access to the care they need.”   (Washington, D.C) – Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Ranking Member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee delivered remarks on the...

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 31 – Senate education committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today released the following statement on the administration’s plan to make some state and federal prisoners eligible for Pell grants: “This may be a worthwhile idea for some prisoners, but the administration absolutely does not...

WASHINGTON, July 30 – House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-Minn.), Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Senate Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-Wash.), and House Ranking Member Bobby Scott (D-Va.) today met to discuss proceeding with a conference committee to...

Agree to recommend House Chairman John Kline to chair the conference committee to reconcile House- and Senate-passed bills   WASHINGTON, July 30 – House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-Minn.), Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Senate Ranking Member...

Murray: “Simply put, in colleges and universities across the country, basic human rights are being violated.” (Washington, D.C.) – Today, Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-WA) delivered remarks at a HELP Committee hearing on Reauthorizing the Higher Education Act:...

Bipartisan bill will improve programs to increase awareness, prevention, and early identification of mental health conditions   WASHINGTON, D.C., July 29 – Senate health committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) and Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-Wash.) today introduced the Mental Health Awareness and Improvement Act, a bill to...

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 29 – Senate education committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today said the committee’s objective, in its work to reauthorize the Higher Education Act, is to ensure that any federal law or regulation will help the nation’s 6,000 colleges and universities create a campus environment that...

(Washington, D.C.) – Yesterday, the U.S. Senate passed a bipartisan resolution from U.S. Senators Orrin Hatch (R-UT) and Patty Murray (D-WA) to commemorate the 25th Anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, which was signed into law on July 26, 1990.   “As we celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Americans with...

(Washington, D.C.) – Today, Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-WA) released the following statement to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Medicare and Medicaid, which were signed into law on July 30, 1965.   “Fifty years ago, President Johnson signed into law a promise to...

Sen. Lamar Alexander walked into Sen. Patty Murray’s office and closed the door. Alexander, a Republican from Tennessee, had just taken control of the education committee in the new GOP-led Senate and was determined to rewrite No Child Left Behind, the main K-12 federal education law. It was early February, and he had released a draft of his...

Some college administrators are complaining they already have enough regulations about responding to sexual assault, but lawmakers like Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.) have no intention of abandoning plans for new federal rules on the issue. The Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pension committee will hold its first hearing Wednesday on the Campus...

Washington, D.C.—Senator Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, the senior Republican in the United States Senate as well as a member and former chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, introduced the Employee Rights Act in the United States Senate today, alongside the sponsor of the House companion...

When it comes to retirement in America, we’re sailing directly into a perfect storm. Never before in human history have more people been looking ahead to more years of retirement. At just the moment that our largest generation, the baby boomers, is entering its golden years, it is becoming harder for Americans to save for retirement. Right...

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 26 – Following today’s vote on an amendment offered by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to repeal Obamacare, Senate health committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), a cosponsor of the amendment, said: “Passing Obamacare was an historic mistake—just last month, tens of thousands...

(Washington, D.C.) – Today, U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA), Ranking Member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee released the following statement commemorating the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, signed into law on July 26, 1990.   “In the 25 years that have passed since...

WASHINGTON, D.C., July 24 – Senate labor committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today led a group of 10 Republican senators in urging the administration to give the public “a reasonable opportunity” to review and respond to its proposed rule to make drastic changes to existing overtime eligibility. Alexander said:...

“If I found myself suddenly at the Vanderbilt University Medical Center emergency room and the doctors there wanted to get my paperwork from the hospital and doctors I usually use —information blocking means that there is some obstacle getting in the way of my personal health information getting sent to them.”– Lamar...