House Democrats aim high with $3 trillion aid plan for states, cities.
$3 trillion plan has assistance for states, cities and counties
WASHINGTON — House Democrats want to “go big” with the next coronavirus relief bill they hope to pass as soon as Friday, a $3 trillion package with billions to help local governments facing massive budget holes, including Houston and San Antonio, as well as another round of stimulus payments, food and housing assistance, and more.
The bill, which Democrats unveiled on Tuesday, is a marker of where House Democrats want to go as lawmakers wrestle with the coronavirus outbreak and as states begin to reopen. At the top of their list is sending $875 billion to states, cities and counties.
“Most of us in the caucus would prefer we go big,” said U.S. Rep. Sylvia Garcia, a Houston Democrat who has served as a presiding municipal judge, a Harris County commissioner and a state senator. “It’s going to have to be big to take care of local governments. You can’t send $10 million to the city of Houston. They’re spending $400 million already on testing.”
The package includes a slew of Democratic priorities, including $3.6 billion in elections funding as they push to expand mail-in voting during the outbreak, as well as $25 billion to bolster the U.S. Postal Service. And it would create a special enrollment period for the Affordable Care Act.
Republicans threw up their hands as the 1,800-page bill was released — a glimpse of the resistance it will undoubtedly face in the Senate.
“They know this bill will never become law or help anyone,” U.S. Rep. Dan Crenshaw, a Houston Republican, tweeted. “This country is in crisis, and Democrats are playing politics.”
The bill includes $200 billion in hazard pay for essential workers and another $75 billion in federal funding for testing and contact tracing as states begin to reopen. It would offer up $175 billion in assistance for renters and homeowners and would bump up the maximum SNAP benefit by 15 percent.
It would also direct another round of $1,200 stimulus checks to taxpayers — and it would direct that assistance to families with mixed immigration status, who have so far been frozen out as Congress has poured $2.5 trillion into coronavirus relief efforts. That change is being championed by Texas Democrats, including Garcia and U.S. Rep. Joaquin Castro of San Antonio.
“That needs to get fixed in this bill,” Castro said. “You have a bunch of U.S. citizens in my district and other districts who are getting nothing. It makes no sense at all. There’s no reason they shouldn’t immediately give relief to every American citizen.”
But the Democrats’ proposal will face stiff resistance, as the Republican majority in the Senate opposes many of the measures Demo
crats are eyeing. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he’s not sure it’s time yet for another relief package and that in the long run, Senate Republicans will “insist” on “narrowly targeted” legislation.
Some in the GOP, including U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, have said they’re wary of sending more money to state governments, viewing it as a bailout for blue states. President Donald Trump, meanwhile, continues to call for a payroll tax cut as Senate Republicans push to include legal protections for businesses reopening amid the outbreak, both of which Democrats have opposed.
McConnell said on Tuesday that Republican Texas Sen. John Cornyn will lead the GOP effort to offer up those protections.
“Now with the states beginning to gradually reopen their economies, we’re staring down the barrel of a second epidemic: one generated by opportunistic lawsuits, crushing legal fees, and drawn out court battles,” Cornyn said this week in a speech on the Senate floor. “We simply cannot allow a flood of frivolous lawsuits to harm our incredible health care workers or stunt our economic recovery.”
Democrats say more help is needed, especially for cities such as Houston and San Antonio, which are staring down budget deficits in the hundreds of millions of dollars for next fiscal year.
Those cities can’t use the aid that Congress has offered so far to close those budget holes and cities across the country are starting to lay off employees and cut programs.
Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner on Tuesday proposed furloughing about 3,000 municipal workers, deferring all police cadet classes and exhausting the city’s $20 million rainy day fund to address a $169 million revenue shortfall for the fiscal year that begins July 1.
In San Antonio, which faces a $200 million budget gap, City Manager Erik Walsh has already cut $82 million in spending, furloughed 270 employees and ended funding to all contracts for arts programs.
Republicans have been hesitant to offer up more money for cities and states, though there may be some bipartisan agreement to giving cities more flexibility in how they spend the assistance they’re set to receive so far.
“We’ve already provided $150 billion,” Cornyn said last week, according to the Washington Post. “If you generate your revenue in a city or county or state by sales tax, and there are no sales because everybody shut down, I think that’s related to the coronavirus and I would favor giving them flexibility.”
U.S. Rep. Al Green, a Houston Democrat, said the next relief package also needs to include assistance for smaller cities, such as Stafford and Missouri City, which are in his district. Federal assistance has so far only gone to cities with 500,000 or more residents. According to the U.S. Conference of Mayors, only 36 American cities have qualified for direct federal assistance so far.
Also at the top of Green’s list is rental assistance funding and money for food banks. Green and Garcia both said they’ve been to Houston-area food distribution sites in recent weeks and have seen the massive lines, with many still waiting after the food runs out.
“I think we start it as big as we need to and we make adjustments if we have to,” Green said of negotiations on the next relief package. “We just cannot walk away from people who have rent to pay, and who have to put food on the table and who are not working. We can’t walk away from them. That would be a line in the dirt for me, walking away from them.”