Mercy Corps Supports Passage of Global Fragility and Violence Reduction Act

Global organization calls for swift vote in the full House of Representatives

Statement from Neal Keny-Guyer, Mercy Corps Chief Executive Officer:

Mercy Corps commends the vote yesterday by the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee in support of the Global Fragility and Violence Reduction Act of 2018 (H.R. 5273). This bipartisan legislation was introduced and sponsored by Representatives Eliot Engel (D-N.Y.), Paul Cook (R-Calif.), Bill Keating (D-Mass.), Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Ted Poe (R-Texas), and Adam Smith (D-Wash.) on March 15.

As House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Representative Ed Royce stated today, the Global Fragility and Violence Reduction Act “will allow the United States to better coordinate efforts to reduce conflict overseas, which has caused unprecedented levels of human displacement.” Committee Ranking Member Eliot Engel highlighted the urgency of the challenges the Act would address: “Global levels of violence have hit a 25-year peak, and when a region faces violence, the effects are felt far and wide. Economic development backslides, global stability wavers, terrorists thrive and people flee their homes, creating large scale refugee and migrant crises. It is critical that we work to prevent this violence from happening in the first place.”

Mercy Corps applauds the leadership of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and calls on the U.S. House of Representatives to schedule a vote by the full body as soon as possible. With more than 68 million people around the world displaced primarily by violence and conflict, we cannot afford to wait another day to pass the Global Fragility and Violence Reduction Act.

To encourage your representative in Congress to support this important legislation, please sign Mercy Corps’ online petition. For more information, visit www.mercycorps.org.