instruction:
Given a paragraph, generate a claim that is supported by the given paragraph. 1) The claim must contain information from within the paragraph. 2) A sentence within the paragraph can be used as a claim. 3) The claim should not have contradictions within the paragraph. 4) The claim should be at most one sentence long.
question:
The chamber’s top Republican, who said he was making enactment of the bill “one of my highest priorities,” issued his proposal at a time when the use of e-cigarettes is growing and underage vaping has soared, raising concerns by health expert s. The measure would apply to all tobacco products, e-cigarettes and vapor products and was co-sponsored by Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., whose state has also been a major tobacco producer. “Kentucky farmers don’t want their children to get hooked on tobacco products while they’re in middle school or high school any more than any parents anywhere want that to happen,” McConnell said on the Senate floor. Fourteen states, including Arkansas, California and Virginia, have enacted laws raising the minimum age for tobacco sales to 21, according to the anti-smoking Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. So have 470 municipalities, including New York City, Chicago, Boston and Minneapolis. Even so, the use of e-cigarettes and vaping has surged, with much of the increase among teenagers. The CDC says most e-cigarettes contain highly addictive nicotine, which can harm the development of young people’s brains and may them likelier to smoke cigarettes later in life. “Youth vaping is a public health crisis,” McConnell said. “It’s our responsibility as parents and public servants to do everything we can to keep these harmful products out of high schools and out of youth culture.” A government survey found that last year 1 in 5 U.S. high school students reported vaping the previous month. “Today, we are coming together to side with young people’s health,” said Kaine, acknowledging the rarity for bipartisan legislation at a time when the two parties can seldom find middle ground. The bill quickly won the endorsement of the American Cancer Society. Its advocacy organization, the Cancer Action Network, said the measure was a “welcome indication that Congress is taking the alarming crisis of increased youth tobacco use seriously and is committed to taking action.” The group also warned the sponsors to resist amendments that could let the federal government pre-empt stronger measures by states and municipalities, exempt some young people or exclude certain products. A similar bill was introduced last month by Sens. Brian Schatz, D-Hawaii, Todd Young, R-Ind., Dick Durbin, D-Ill., and Mitt Romney, R-Utah. Most experts agree e-cigarettes are less harmful than the paper-and-tobacco variety because they don’t produce all the cancer-causing byproducts found in smoke. But researchers say they are only beginning to understand the risks of e-cigarettes, which they think may damage the lungs and contribute to precancerous growths. McConnell has long been involved in tobacco issues. He helped pass the 2004 tobacco buyout, when the government provided billions of dollars for growers who lost money with the end of federal price supports. Kentucky has the highest cancer mortality rate in the country, with nearly 186 deaths per 100,000 residents in 2017, according to the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As health concerns about tobacco have grown in the U.S., demand and production of the crop have fallen in Kentucky, where it had long been a pillar of the state’s economy. Growers have been relying increasingly on industrial hemp, which McConnell has helped legalize. The CDC calls tobacco products the country’s top cause of preventable disease and death, with almost 40 million adult cigarette smokers. The agency says around 4.7 million middle school and high school students use at least one tobacco product, including e-cigarettes. Treating adults with smoking-related diseases costs the country nearly $170 billion annually for medical care. The country’s biggest tobacco company, Altria Group, has invested in the e-cigarette company Juul and has backed bills raising the minimum age for buying tobacco and vaping products to 21. Critics have suggested that support is aimed at forestalling tougher restrictions such as banning flavored vaping products and menthol cigarettes. ___ AP Health Writer Matthew Perrone contributed to this report.
answer:
Senate GOP leader would raise age for buying tobacco to 21.


question:
"Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew is urging Congress to pass legislation to deal with Puerto Rico’s debt crisis, saying that without action the economy and welfare of the U.S. territory will continue to deteriorate. During an interview on the Bloomberg network, Lew said that Puerto Rican hospitals are ill-equipped to deal with the spread of the Zika virus, that schools are closing and that the failing economy is driving people out. ""You have broad economic stress causing people to leave the island,"" Lew said May 3, 2016. ""Almost 100,000 people left Puerto Rico last year."" For an island with a total population around 3.5 million, that’s a serious exodus. We decided to see if Lew was right. Looking at the data Census data shows a small, but steady increase in the number of people leaving Puerto Rico for the mainland. More than 360,000 people went from Puerto Rico to the United States btween 2010 and 2014. However, the Census data isn’t out for 2015, which is the year Lew was talking about. So where did Lew get that figure? The estimate comes from the U.S. Department of Transportation, which tracks passengers departing from and arriving to the island. The Treasury Department has relied on this data before, according to department spokesperson Daniel Watson. The data show about 90,000 more people left Puerto Rico for the United States than came in. *The American Community Survey showing total out-migration of Puerto Rico to the US mainland **T-100 Domestic Market Data (US Carriers) None of this data includes people leaving Puerto Rico for somewhere other than the United States. Islanders mostly tend to head to the mainland, however, countries in Latin America, the Dominican Republic and Spain have been attracting Puerto Ricans as well. So the total number of migrants leaving the island is actually larger. Recent qualitative interviews by researchers from the Center for Puerto Rican Studies found that the people leaving Puerto Rico in the greatest numbers are nurses, paramedics, police officers, teachers, college professors and lawyers. They are often recruited and going to states with growing Hispanic populations in need of bilingual professionals. The surge in departures has led to the social media tag #yonomequito (""I am not going anywhere""). On Facebook this movement has been liked by 70,000 people. Our ruling Lew said that ""almost 100,000 people left Puerto Rico last year."" That appears to be close. Airline data suggests about 89,000 more people departed Puerto Rico for the United States then entered it in 2015. While that’s not a perfect estimate to measure out-migration, all the population trends suggest Puerto Rico is experiencing a surge in out-migration, as residents leave for better jobs and prospects in the United States. Lew’s statement is ."
answer:
Almost 100,000 people left Puerto Rico last year.


question:
But some experts and Democrats warn that the candidates risk exacerbating a public health crisis if they go too far in politicizing the virus that causes the COVID-19 illness. Former Vice President Joe Biden, former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Minnesota Sen. Amy Klobuchar all went after Trump during their CNN town halls Wednesday night. A number of the candidates have released their own pandemic policies, and Bloomberg is even airing an ad contrasting Trump’s response to the outbreak to his own handling of the aftermath of Sept. 11. It’s a potent political issue, as it gets at what Democrats see as two major potential weaknesses for Trump: questions about his competence as president and health care issues. “The threat from coronavirus and the chaos of the administration is front and center in everyone’s mind,” said Jesse Ferguson, a longtime Democratic strategist and former spokesman for Hillary Clinton’s campaign. “Not talking about it means you’re missing voters who are deeply worried about the public health threat and deeply concerned about the Trump administration’s incompetence.” Warren, Klobuchar and Bloomberg have all released public health plans detailing how they’d address and prevent similar outbreaks as president. During their CNN town halls, Warren warned that the economic impact of the new coronavirus could get worse. She and Klobuchar slammed Trump’s decision to put Vice President Mike Pence in charge of the coronavirus response, noting his controversial handling of an HIV outbreak in Indiana when he was governor. Biden has previously slammed Trump for “hysterical xenophobia and fearmongering” rather than respecting science on the issue. Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, another 2020 Democratic hopeful, issued a statement Thursday night calling for Trump to allow her state to buy COVID-19 testing kits from Japan. She said the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was “failing to provide them.” “As an island state, with responsible leadership, we can keep this virus out. But, we won’t be able to do that without our state and federal leaders taking it much more seriously than they are right now,” she said. But sounding the alarm on the administration’s coronavirus response also holds risks. Florida Rep. Donna Shalala, who served as secretary of health and human services under President Bill Clinton in the 1990s, had a stark warning for Democrats. “Don’t open your mouth until you know what you’re talking about. This is politics. They need to listen to the scientists as well,” she said. That is a major criticism Democrats have lobbed at Trump — that he has botched his response and fostered more confusion by publicly contradicting the scientists in his administration about the severity of the virus. On Wednesday, the Republican president sought to minimize fears at a White House press conference in which he insisted the U.S. is “very, very ready” for an outbreak and predicted: “This will end … there’s no reason to be panicked.” But standing next to him, the health officials in charge of handling the outbreak predicted more cases are coming in the U.S. Democrats are not immune to the critique themselves, however. During Tuesday night’s primary debate, both Biden and Bloomberg made the erroneous claim that Trump cut funding for the CDC. While Trump proposed cuts to the CDC in his budget blueprint, he was overruled by Congress, and the eventual budget he signed included an increase in funding. Biden corrected his comments during Wednesday night’s CNN town hall but went on to warn that Trump “did not have a plan to deal with how you equip hospitals.” Bloomberg, meanwhile, criticized Trump at a Houston rally on Thursday, accusing him of “burying his head in the sand” and charging that “his failure to prepare is crippling our ability to respond.” But the public health system has a playbook to follow for pandemic preparation — regardless of who’s president or whether specific instructions are coming from the White House. Those plans were put into place in anticipation of another flu pandemic but are designed to work for any respiratory-borne disease. Jen Kates, senior vice president and director of global health and HIV policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, warned that “any time political ideology starts to dominate the dialogue, it puts the public at risk.” “The history of good public health is that when things become politicized, we risk a good sound response and a response based on science and expertise,” she said. “This is a situation that’s changing by the moment, and that makes it all the more delicate.” Kates warned that there should be some “caution around not stoking panic and not using the partisan environment to steer away from basic public health messaging” — but acknowledged that will be tough “in a very partisan time, during campaign season.” Both parties are guilty of politicizing public health pandemics when they’re not the party in charge of the White House, she noted. During the Ebola outbreak in 2014, Republicans routinely slammed the Obama administration for similar critiques Trump is facing from Democrats — namely, that he was too slow to respond and didn’t appoint an adviser to coordinate the government’s response quickly enough. But Kathleen Sebelius, who served as Obama’s secretary of health and human services from 2009 to 2014, said Democrats have a lot more to criticize when it comes to Trump’s response. “We have the components of what could be a perfect storm. Are there ways to deal with it calmly and rationally? You bet. Is the United States well prepared? It seems like there are some gaps,” she said. She pointed to the fact that the initial White House funding request was just a fraction of what had been allocated for past viral outbreaks like Ebola, and Trump himself has largely left it up to Congress to sort out the details. She also noted that a number of key positions set up by Obama to deal with global pandemics have now either been eliminated or left vacant, and she called out Trump for contradicting his own scientists on the severity of the threat. Shalala agreed — but she warned Democrats to be “careful” to focus their critiques on the president and not the experts in the administration who are trying to tackle the crisis. “There are things that they can criticize, like the inadequate funding request and the president muddying the waters” at his press conference, she said, “but they shouldn’t be criticizing the agency heads and the very good scientist physicians that are trying to do their jobs.” But some Democrats say the conversation around the coronavirus is fair game because it gets at a much broader issue for Trump: questions surrounding his leadership. “Electing a president isn’t about a series of issue check boxes on a spreadsheet. It’s about the public’s confidence that you can lead the country, especially in times of crisis,” Ferguson said. “If we can’t demonstrate the fundamental failure of this administration to lead in this crisis, then we are not talking about the thing that people think about when electing a president.” ___ Catch up on the 2020 election campaign with AP experts on our weekly politics podcast, “Ground Game.”
answer:

White House hopefuls target Trump on coronavirus response.