Better act on stimulus now, Democrats warn
The clock is ticking on getting COVID relief to struggling Americans, top Democrats said Sunday.
Congress has just 48 hours to pass the next stimulus if that’s going to happen before the Nov. 3 election, said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
She indicated Democrats are working on how the stimulus package would handle COVID testing and tracing.
“We’re seeking clarity, because … with all due respect to some of the people in the president’s administration, they’re not legislators,” Pelosi said on ABC’s “This Week.”
Earlier this month, the Democrat-led House passed a $2.2 trillion spending package, and the Republican-controlled Senate has been working on a scaled-down form of aid.
“We had pages and pages of how you would do this in the minority community. They crossed it all out,” Pelosi said of Republicans.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D -N.Y.) fumed over feds’ sitting on “as much as $9 billion in testing, tracing funds.”
“While COVID cases rise across the country and tick up here in New York, the feds are sitting on billions of dollars that should be long out the door and used to ramp up testing and tracing, especially in the face of a possible second wave,” he said in a Sunday statement.
“[The Department of Health and Human Services] should release those funds because the intention of Congress was to apply them to this crisis, and second, the administration must commit to a continued testing regime as the winter approaches, and that will cost money,” Schumer added.
Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin are expected to speak Monday, according to Politico.