Trump says stimulus relief negotiations over until after election, upending aid talks

WASHINGTON — Coronavirus stimulus talks screeched to a halt Tuesday as President Donald Trump ordered Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to stop negotiating with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi until after the election.

In a series of tweets posted less than 24 hours after he was released from the hospital, Trump accused Pelosi, D-Calif., of not negotiating in good faith after she rejected an opening bid from Mnuchin in their latest round of talks.

“I have instructed my representatives to stop negotiating until after the election when, immediately after I win, we will pass a major Stimulus Bill that focuses on hard-working Americans and Small Business,” Trump wrote.

Trump’s announcement contrasted recommendations from Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, who had said in a speech hours earlier that more economic stimulus was needed to sustain the recovery.

Trump’s tweets sent the stock market lower as many businesses, households, and investors had been hoping for a sudden jolt of fiscal stimulus amid signs that the economy had lost momentum. The Dow Jones industrial average ended up down 376 points, or by 1.3 percent. The Nasdaq and S&P 500 also fell.

Barring another unexpected development, Trump’s declaration kills any near-term chance of new aid for millions of Americans who remain out work and at risk of eviction. Pelosi and Mnuchin spoke shortly after Trump’s tweets, and Mnuchin informed Pelosi that the negotiations were over, according to Pelosi’s spokesman.

Trump said he had asked Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., “not to delay, but to instead focus full time on approving my outstanding nominee to the United States Supreme Court, Amy Coney Barrett.”

McConnell, who spoke with Trump shortly before the president’s announcement, said he agreed with the decision.

“I think his view was that they were not going to produce a result and we needed to concentrate on what’s achievable,” the majority leader told reporters at the Capitol.

Trump’s pronouncement was so stunning, coming after days of sustained if long-shot negotiations between Pelosi and Mnuchin, that Pelosi speculated to Democratic colleagues on a conference call that the president’s sudden change in position might be connected to the steroids he’s taking as he battles coronavirus.

“Believe me, there are people who thought, who think that steroids have an impact on your thinking,” she told her Democratic colleagues, according to someone on the call.

“So, I don’t know.”

The White House’s focus now appears to have shifted from the economic talks to solely pushing for the Supreme Court confirmation. Although several Republican senators have tested positive for the novel coronavirus, which causes the illness covid-19, McConnell is moving forward with Barrett’s nomination to get her confirmed before the election.

Trump’s move disappointed some members of his own party who were hoping to be able to deliver new relief to their constituents.

“I disagree with the President,” Rep. John Katko, a Republican congressman from New York in a tough reelection race, wrote on Twitter. “With lives at stake, we cannot afford to stop negotiations on a relief package.”