INTERVIEW — PAUL WINFREE – federal budget expert and director of the Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation

• BIO: Paul Winfree, an economist and leading voice in Washington for free markets and fiscal responsibility, is director of the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation. He also is the think tank’s inaugural Richard F. Aster fellow. Winfree, previously a senior policy analyst in Heritage’s Center for Data Analysis, returned to the think tank in 2015 after serving as director of income security at the Senate Committee on the Budget. He was responsible for the committee’s work on tax, health, and welfare policy.  He also helped develop legislative proposals, including congressional budget resolutions and annual appropriations bills.
• TOPIC: Zika Funds Available- Florida increased its fight against Zika after 14 confirmed cases of the virus were contracted locally.  Police are even giving out insect repellant to homeless people in the Miami area where the outbreak seems the worst.  The Obama Administration says they are running out of funds to combat the Zika virus but federal budget expert Paul Winfree says Zika could be paid for with Ebola funds.  He found there are about $2.77 billion in unobligated balances from the 2015 fiscal year Ebola emergency supplemental appropriation that could be used towards a fighting Zika.
• President Barack Obama on Thursday said it was time for Congress to lay aside politics and to act to provide additional money to combat the Zika virus before government funding dries up. (Reuters | Thu Aug 4, 2016 9:14pm EDT) –  “Our experts at the CDC, the folks on the front lines have been doing their best in making due by moving funds from other areas, but now the money we need to fight Zika is rapidly running out,” Obama said at a press conference at the Pentagon. He warned that development of a vaccine for the virus could be delayed if Congress does not provide any more money and urged Americans to contact lawmakers to pressure them to take up the issue. Concern over the threat from Zika, which can cause a birth defect called microcephaly marked by small head size that can lead to severe developmental problems in babies, has risen since Florida authorities last week detected the first signs of local transmission in the continental United States. Zika funding remains stalled six months after Obama asked the Republican-led Congress to approve $1.9 billion in emergency funds.