Pelosi, Mnuchin cite relief progress
WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-calif., and Treasury Secretary Stevenmnuchin cited progress Thursday in their ongoing coronavirus-relief negotiations less than three weeks before the November elections.
However, the Democratic leader raised concerns about whether any big spending package could pass Congress given fierce resistance in the Gop-controlled Senate
Pelosi and Mnuchin have been discussing a newspendingdealbetween $1.8 trillion and $2.2 trillion, though President Donald Trump has said he would support even more.
The rapidly developing changes came late Thursday after a nearly 90-minute conversation between the two negotiators.
They both cited progress in resolving one of Pelosi’s top demands, for a national strategic testing plan to better detect the coronavirus.
Mnuchin told her the White House would accept the Democrats’ proposalwithsome“minor” modifications, according to Pelosi’s spokesman — confirming comments Mnuchin himself had made earlier in the day.
However, opposition from Senate Republicans emerged Thursday as a formidable obstacle to any deal actually passing Congress before Election Day.
Majority Leader Mitch Mcconnell, R-KY., and Senate Republicans already had made known their discomfort with any big new spending plan.
Mcconnell next week plans to put a roughly $500 billion package on the Senate floor, close to a quarter the size of the package Mnuchin and Pelosi are working on.
The Senate GOP leader spent much of Thursday doubling down on his opposition, publicly denouncing the White House deal taking shape and swatting away Trump’s directive to “Go big or go home!!!”
“He is willing to go higher than my members are,” Mcconnell said of Trump while speaking at a medical center in Princeton, Ky.
Mcconnell said he didn’t think Pelosi and Mnuchin would reach a deal anyway. And at an earlier event, the majority leader all but ruled out a vote on a large-scale relief bill.
“You’re correct we’re in discussions with the secretary of the Treasury and the speaker about a higher amount,” Mcconnell told a reporter. “That’s not what I’m going to put on the floor.”
Pelosi raised the issue of Mcconnell’s opposition in her call with Mnuchin, according to her spokesman, Drew Hammill.
“The secretary indicated that the president would weigh in with Leader Mcconnell should an agreement be reached,” Hammill wrote on Twitter.
Trump’s uneven posturing appears to only have strengthened Pelosi’s determination to hold out for a bigger deal, despite pressure from a number of House Democrats to reach an agreement now.
On a private call with members of her caucus Thursday afternoon, Pelosi said House Democrats have “maximum leverage” now, according to several people on the call who spoke on condition of anonymity.
She said the Mnuchin proposal remains inadequate, and said she couldn’t accept something that the administration can’t even sell to the Senate.
“The president’s even said this morning that he wants more. He said the night before that, ‘Go big or go home,’” Pelosi told her members.
“So, this is not the time to say, ‘OK, let’s fold.’ This is whatwehave been building up to.”