WORK RESUMES ON RELIEF PACKAGE
White House sends mixed messages about negotiations
The White House sent mixed signals Thursday about the direction of renewed stimulus talks, resulting in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi confronting Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin over who speaks for the president.
The developments occurred two days after President Donald Trump ordered Mnuchin to stop negotiating with Pelosi, only to announce Thursday that talks were back on. Pelosi, D-Calif., said Democrats were still ready to deal.
According to Pelosi’s spokesman, Mnuchin and Pelosi spoke by phone Thursday afternoon to discuss prospects for a comprehensive economic relief bill when White House communications director Alyssa Farah told reporters at the White House that the administration does not support legislation of that kind.
“We’ve made very clear we want a skinny package” consisting of stimulus checks, an airline bailout and smallbusiness relief, “but not part of a larger package,” Farah said in comments distributed in a White House pool report.
Farah’s comments appeared to contradict what Pelosi had just heard from Mnuchin — which was that Trump supported reaching a more comprehensive deal, Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill said.
“The Speaker pointed out that, unfortunately, the White
House Communications Director contradicted that assertion during their call. The Speaker trusts that the Secretary speaks for the President,” Hammill said on Twitter.
A spokesperson for Mnuchin had no comment.
The exchange clouded prospects for a deal of any kind, comprehensive or otherwise, less than four weeks before the November elections.
Pelosi and Mnuchin had been discussing a package be
tween $1.6 trillion to $2.2 trillion before Trump pulled the plug on talks on Tuesday — a decision he back-pedaled on several hours later.
On Wednesday, Pelosi and Mnuchin began discussing a bill that would have focused solely on helping airlines, but there was backlash to that idea from some Democrats and unions who questioned why airlines would get help but not others. By Thursday morning Pelosi made her demands for a new, broader package clear. She nixed the
idea of passing a stand-alone bill to help solely the airline industry, which has recently begun large-scale furloughs because a federal aid program expired last week.
Pelosi said Thursday that any aid for the airline industry would only be considered if it were part of a larger relief package to meet other economic needs.
“The only point about negotiations is, ain’t going to be no stand-alone bill unless there’s a bigger bill, and it could be part of that or it
could be in addition to that,” Pelosi told reporters at her weekly news conference.
She said she and Mnuchin were still talking.
“We’re at the table. We want to continue the conversation. We’ve made some progress. We’re exchanging language. So we’ll see how we connect,” Pelosi said.
Mnuchin has already negotiated numerous spending and budget deals with Pelosi, but some Republicans in the White House and on Capitol Hill have been wary of the deals he cuts with Democrats. And the comments from Farah on Thursday gave some Democrats pause as they tried to discern the White House’s current strategy.
There appears to be a new sense of urgency from the White House and some congressional Republicans to reach some sort of agreement amid signs that the economic recovery is weakening.
Trump said in a Fox Business interview that economic relief talks were back on track, citing his desire for another round of $1,200 stimulus checks in addition to airline aid and small business assistance.
“Well I shut down talks two days ago because they weren’t working out. Now they are starting to work out, we’re starting to have some very productive talks,” Trump said in an interview on Fox Business Network.
He said he believes Pelosi “wants it to happen, because it’s so good for our country, we really need it.”
Despite all the muddle the two sides appeared to be back to roughly where they were Tuesday morning, before Trump abruptly announced talks were over and he was asking Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, RKy., to focus on filling the Supreme Court vacancy instead. McConnell on Thursday, speaking in Kentucky, where he is campaigning for re-election, also talked about the need to approve additional aid.
“We’re going to tackle this again. The timing is uncertain based on the proximity to the election,” McConnell said at an event in Bourbon County.