Title: COVID–19 Language Access Act
Policy area: Government Operations and Politics

Summary:
COVID-19 Language Access Act
This bill requires each federal agency that receives federal assistance related to the COVID-19 (i.e., coronavirus disease 2019) pandemic to translate any English language written material prepared for the general public relating to the pandemic, including COVID-19 vaccine distribution and education, into specified languages not later than seven days after such material is made available in English.
Such languages shall include, at a minimum, the following: Spanish, Arabic, Cambodian, Chinese, Haitian Creole, French, Hindi, Hmong, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Laotian, Russian, Tagalog, Urdu, Vietnamese, Greek, Polish, Thai, and Portuguese.

[Congressional Bills 117th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H.R. 1009 Introduced in House (IH)]

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117th CONGRESS
  1st Session
                                H. R. 1009

 To require all Federal agencies to translate COVID-19 materials into 
              multiple languages, and for other purposes.


_______________________________________________________________________


                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                           February 11, 2021

Ms. Meng (for herself, Ms. Clarke of New York, Mr. Green of Texas, Ms. 
Schakowsky, Ms. Lee of California, Mr. Espaillat, Ms. Blunt Rochester, 
  Ms. Barragan, Mr. Case, Mr. Lieu, Ms. Velazquez, Mr. Grijalva, Mr. 
Gomez, Ms. Porter, Ms. Roybal-Allard, Mr. Kilmer, Mrs. Napolitano, Ms. 
Pressley, Ms. Castor of Florida, Ms. Sanchez, Mr. Horsford, Ms. Eshoo, 
 Mrs. Hayes, Mr. Price of North Carolina, Mr. Cardenas, Mr. McNerney, 
 Ms. Strickland, Mr. Lowenthal, Mr. Hastings, Mr. Sires, Mr. Garcia of 
  Illinois, Mr. Carson, Ms. Jackson Lee, Ms. Newman, Ms. Jayapal, Mr. 
 Brendan F. Boyle of Pennsylvania, Mr. Torres of New York, Ms. Johnson 
of Texas, Mr. Higgins of New York, Mr. Evans, and Mr. Meeks) introduced 
 the following bill; which was referred to the Committee on Oversight 
                               and Reform

_______________________________________________________________________

                                 A BILL


 
 To require all Federal agencies to translate COVID-19 materials into 
              multiple languages, and for other purposes.

    Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the 
United States of America in Congress assembled,

SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

    This Act may be cited as the ``COVID-19 Language Access Act''.

SEC. 2. TRANSLATION OF MATERIALS.

    (a) In General.--Each Federal agency that receives Federal 
assistance related to the COVID-19 pandemic shall translate any English 
language written material prepared for the general public relating to 
such pandemic, including COVID-19 vaccine distribution and education, 
into the languages described in subsection (b) not later than 7 days 
after any such material is made available in English.
    (b) Languages Covered.--The material described in subsection (a) 
shall be translated, at a minimum, into Spanish, Arabic, Cambodian, 
Chinese, Haitian Creole, French, Hindi, Hmong, Italian, Japanese, 
Korean, Laotian, Russian, Tagalog, Urdu, Vietnamese, Greek, Polish, 
Thai, and Portuguese.
    (c) Definition of COVID-19 Pandemic.--In this section, the term 
``COVID-19 pandemic'' means the public health emergency declared by the 
Secretary pursuant to section 319 of the Public Health Service Act on 
January 31, 2020, entitled ``Determination that a Public Health 
Emergency Exists Nationwide as the Result of the 2019 Novel 
Coronavirus''.
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